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SIGNIFICANCE OF
IMMORTALITY IN
THOMAS AQUINAS
J. Obi Oguejiofor
Copyright 2001 by
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Oguejiofor, J. Obi (Josephat Obi)
The philosophical significance of immortality in
Thomas Aquinas / J. Obi Oguejiofor.
p. cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
I. Immortality (Philosophy)-History. 2. Thomas, Aquinas,
Saint, 1225?-1274. 1. Title.
BD421.038 2000 I 29-dc2I 00-048857 CIP
ISBN 0-7618-1910-X (cloth: alk. ppr.)
I
Contents
Contents
Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction
vii
ix
xi
3
11
14
21
77
77
86
86
98
118
127
139
139
146
151
159
164
175
175
182
192
201
211
215
CONCLUSION
BmLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
229
vi
Preface
107
III
Though philosophical discussions on the question of uninterrupted
existence of the human soul post mortem is today very few and far
between, the doctrine is still a widely held conception about the human
. destiny. This fact alone merits the issue of immortality a serious place
in the scheme of philosophical endeavours. This is because it is a
vaunted characteristic of philosophy not to exclude a priori any aspect
of reality from its embrace. That is perhaps why the question of
immortality found a place in the philosophy of many epochs. Still a
most perfunctory survey of the history of philosophy indicates that
debates on the reality of immortality have been uppermost in times of
special philosophical awakening.
The thirteenth century is in a special way one of the most sigoificant
centuries in the history of such philosophical aWakening. The
importance of the century in the history of philosophy immediately
brings to the fore the relevance of examining the question of
immortality in the philosophy of the time, and especially how the most
towering thinker of the century, Thomas Aquinas, attempted to show
through the power of reason that immortality is tenable.
The philosophical reinvigoration of the century encountered many
obstacles occasioned by the consequences of the integration of
Aristotelian naturalistic philosophy into the then prevalent scheme of
thought. Many of the problems arose from the new conception of man
and his soul engendered by this naturalism, and its logical implications
for the doctrine of immortality. Aqninas played a pivotal role in the
eventual triumph of Aristotelian philosophy not ouly in his time, but
also much later. This study attempts to explore how he tried to solve the
problem of immortality within the context of Aristotelian philosophy. It
highlights the importance of the issue in the century, starting from the
philosophical forebears of the angelic doctor. It also examines how the
question of immortality can be said to be one of the most determinant
vii
Introduction
A remarkable feature of studies on Thomas Aquinas, even those
devoted specifically to the question of the soul, is the perfunctory
treatment that is given to the question" of immortality. This is partly
because the question of metaphysical immortality has in recent times
progressively been of very peripheral interest in philosophy in general.
This tendency has a lot to do with the growing disinterestedness in
religion, coupled with the religious undertone which the whole question
of immortality has had since its inroads into philosophical discussions:
A consequence of this tendency is that medieval scholarship has very
" often also been affected by the desire to work within the mainstream,
and to concentrate on themes that are aIdn to the dominant
philosophical interests of the age. While such an influence has very
positive aspects, it can also have the effect of relegating to the sideline
a doctrine which perhaps more than any other was determinant in the
shaping of the philosophical movement of the thirteenth century.
The relatively few studies of immortality in the philosophy of
Thomas Aquinas have other features which are no less remarkable. In
the first place, they are mostly published in the form of short artieles,
whose amplitude is obviously not enough to allow a comprehensive
overview of the issues, let alone determine their importance. Second,
most of them take account only of the few arguments outlined in the
Summo thealagioe, and consequently, the significance of the theme in
Aquinas, as in the general philosophical trend of the thirteenth century
pales under this background. Another feature is that the context of the
thirteenth century, in which Aquinas worked, and which had enormous
influence on his treatment of immortality, is often not given due weight.
Vet the question of the immortality of the rational soul detennined
more than any other single factor the history of Aristotelianism in that
century. Again, due to the style of argument in which most of the
discourses of the angelic doctor are couched, those studies have either
been aimed at raising problems with regard to the tenability of the
xi
xii
Introduction
xiii
II
!
t
I
I
doctrines, which already started in the twelfth century, and the level of
their philosophical aWareness. Some sparks of originality, nevertheless,
emerge from the efforts of these thinkers to prove immortality On
rational grounds: the spinning of doctrines and principles to suit old
argwnents, the spinning of new argwnents, the rejection of some older
proofs, as well as the grading of demonstrations according to their
perceived convincing power. The so-called Latin Averroism is ./
reviewed to show that it -is a factor which the inunediate predecessors
of Aquinas may not have been fully aware of, but which exerted an
important influence on Aquinas' discourses on immortality.
Aquinas' philosophical anthropology is very much influenced by the
doctrine of inunortality. Man is a hylemorphic composite in the best
tradition of Aristotle. Though the soul and the body are so intimately
united, Aquinas' philosophy of man is not much more than his ideas
about the soul. That these are also very much affected by the issue of
inunortality is seen by a review of his conception of the soul as a
subsistent form, the plurality of forms and individuation in the human
composite, as well as the nature of the intellect, the process of
intellectual knowledge, and the nature of knowledge itself. These issues
are examined in the second chapter with the aim of highlighting the
often hidden nuances and slants given to them which can, in the final
analysis, be taken as preparation for the defence of inunortality.
The study of his view of man and his soul is all the more necessary
because most of what he said on immortality is encapsulated in the
passages in several of his works where he expressly defends the
doctrine with proofs. These proofs are reviewed in chapter three. They
are mostly founded on the philosophical presuppositions that had
become the patrimony of the thinkers of the period, on the assumption
of the accepted principles of the time, and on appeal to the conscious
experience of humankind. Thomas follows very faithfully in his
argwnents the thirteenth century style of outliuing objections to issues
at stake, as well as the contrary position before seeking re_conciliation.
xiv
Introduction
t
t
!I
xv
Chapter 1
had on the reflections of the thinkers of the thne than from the mnnber of
pages consecrated to it. Even then, a perfunctory survey of the history of
masters.
Blund's treatise was the last such treatise written by a notable arts
master till Siger of Brabant, well into the second half of the century. Still
the theologians who occupied themselves with the question of the soul
and its innnortality were not strangers to the arts faculty and the new
soul.
1.2 Doctrinal Impetus to the Discussions on Immortality
Most prominent among the sources that exposed the thinkers of the
early thirteenth century to new doctrines, and hence to new ways of
thinking, was Aristotle. The Stagirite came in a retinue of ancient
commentators including Alexander of Aphrodisias, Themistius and
types of souls is owed to the diversity of matter that enters into their
composition. On intellection, he stated in the De anima that the agent
But there is the objection that form gives being. and that matter in itself
is imperfect. Hence perfection comes from form. Therefore if the soul is
the perfection of an organic body with the potency of having life, the
soul is fonn. But no form exists separately from substance. Therefore if
the soul is form, it cannot be separated from the body. but perishes with
intellect is responsible for the evolution of the material intellect into the
habitual by making material forms intelligible. As the agent intellect is
the highest material form, it communicates its intelligibility to other
lower intelligibles. Actual abstraction is, of course, carried out by the
human intellect, but this act is enabled by the agent intellect conferring
on intelligible objects the propensity to be amenable to the abstractive
powers of the human soul." In the De intelleetu, the noetic function of
the agent intellect was slightly altered. It no longer acts on the potential
objects of intellection, but rather on the material intellect itself to endow
it with abstractive power. In the De anima, Alexander further identified
the agent intellect with God or the first cause of Aristotle, and following
Aristotle, enumerated its characteristics as separate, impassable, and
unmixed, being completely outside the realm of matter. It is also
immortal because it is always in act, and therefore independent of all
potentiality.
The logical implication of Alexander's exegesis of Aristotle is that the
material and the habitual intellects are perishable. He nevertheless
asserted a kind of inunortality for man, arising from the identity between
the thinking subject and the object of thought. If the object of thought is
material form, it is inextricably bound up with matter and is perishable.
When on the other hand the object is intrinsically intelligible, and hence
the body.17
37
point. It means that other influences were at work, and here we would
like to mention the universal hylemorphism of Solomon Ibn Gabirol.
The teaching of Gabirol became available to the West through the
translation of the Fans vitae by John of Spain and Dominic
Gundissalinus in the twelfth century. For Gabirol, God excepted, all
beings are composed of matter and form. There is in creation a potential.
and universal essence made up of universal form and universal prime
matter. Each being is the bringing into actualization of this common
essence. While this philosophy was a handy tool with which Christian
theologians made a distinction between God and creatures, it introduced
a disturbing element into the usual conception of the soul as a simple
spiritual substance. In universal hylemorphism, spiritual substances are
also composed of spiritual matter and form, which explains adequately
the facts ofindividuation and change in them.
However, the mingling of spiritual matter in the metaphysical
composition of the soul detracts from its simplicity, and any attenuating
of simplicity seriously endangers the immortality of the rational soul.
Matter is after all the principle of corruption in organic beings because it
introduces contraries in these beings. To accept matter as an essential
composition of the soul was therefore very uncomfortable. Many authors
of the time rejected the theory of Gabiro!. Albert the Great equivocated
on the issue and then put forward an alternative theory which amounts to
its acceptance. From Odo Rigaldus on, the doctrine was repeatedly
. accepted by a succession of Franciscan thinkers. In any case, whether
they accepted the theory or not each of the thinkers had to tackle the
disjunctions it hrought in connection with the tenet of immortality. John
Blund, for instance, was very circumspect lest the doctrine got in the way
of consistent defence of immortality. He outlined the arguroent of the
proponents of the doctrine as follows:
Among the things created by the first cause in effect there are two types
of causes, one of which is corporeal and the other spiritual. But it is
such in the corporeal that their essence is constituted from matter and
fonn. But spiritual essences are even' more constituted. Therefore when
the more stable have being, they have this by way of stronger being in
effect through spiritual m"atter and spititual fonn. When therefore the
soul is one of the spiritual creatures, it will have composition from
matter and fonn, and so the rational soul is composed of matter and
fonn.42
10
II
And even if there were spiritual matter and spiritual form in the soul. it
will nevertheless not be corruptible, since it lacks contraries, which are
the cause of corruption.43
We have already remarked that Albert was among the rare figures of
the thirteenth century who rejected AriStotle's popular definition of the
soul. A fair-minded thinker that he is, he reviewed two definitions drawn
from the Stagirite. The first definition, which views the soul as the first
act of an organic body with the potency oflife, he accepts with measured
reservations. To be the act of the body is, for him, intrinsic to the nature
of the soul. However, the definition is an attempt to comprehend the
soul from the perspective of its substantial activity. The soul can be
understood from two perspectives: from its relationship with the body, in
which case it is actus corporis physici. The second way is to take the
soul in itself, in its essence as soul. From this second point of view, the
soul's relation with the body is secondary or accidental to its essence,
even though it is also pennissible to define the soul a posteriori from the
point of view of this relation.
Albert turned to Avicenna in order to appreciate Aristotle's definition.
He borrowed the Persian philosopher's simile of the soul as a mover.
Whatever is moved has a mover. A mover can be defined from the point
of view of his activity of moving or in so far as it has its proper existence
as a substance. The soul considered as a mover has something essential
to it over and above its function as a mover. It not only functions in the
body, but has also its own existence and activity independent of the
body. Albert thus makes a complete turn to Plato's idea of the soul
occupying the body as a sailor his ship.47 But his line of argument is not
capricious. It has an underlying logic, the logic ofimmortality. The soul
viewed as a fonn would not have an independent existence, and that is
why Albert refused to accept Aristotle's first definition as adequate,48
The second definition that is regarded as acceptable states that the
soul is "principium et causa hujusmodi vitae, scilicet corporis organici."
The attitude of Blund shows that his ulterior concern was the
preservation of immortality. That same attitude would mark the
philosophical works of most of the thinkers of the thirteenth century,
including Thomas Aquinas. Some of the factors we have outlined were
not directly seen as posing a problem for the doctrine of immortality, and
again they did not have an equal impact on all the authors. There is
much to be said about the view that with the rigidly structured university
education, and then with the interdependence of the thinkers on one
another, a stereotype in the explanation of the soul and the defence of its
immortality became quickly widespread. Still the philosophy of the
major thinkers was deeply marked by the question of immortality.
William of Auvergne strongly rejected any doctrine that would either
bring the soul into too close a contact with the body or the world of
matter. He thus rejected the theory of abstraction in order to be able to
argue that the soul is completely independent in knowledge. Again, in
order to preserve its simplicity and consequently its immortality, he
rejected the idea that the soul has different types of intellect
distinguishable one from ,the other." E. Moody rightly expresses the
tailoring of Auvergne's doctrine to fit immortality:
The doctrine of inunortality fits fairly easily into William's system; the
arguments he advances are like a review of the different topics
previously dealt with and they reveal the fact that one of the dominant
influences guiding William's analysis of the soul, with respect to its
Il
12
To say that the soul is the source of life leaves undisturbed ils essential
independence of the body. Indeed, f9r Albert, it is first and foremost
because the soul is a source of life that it can serve as the life-giver. the
first act or the perfection of the body. Thus its essential parts are not
sununarized by the function of perfecting the body. This enables Albert
to hold that the soul is a separate and independent essence, without
denying that it has a basic link with the body. In the De anima"Albert
pursued the same argument on the grounds that a higher being embodies
the perfection of the lower being. Hence it is impossible that an essence
that is not separable from the corporeal should be the subject of a
separable essence. On the contrary, operations can flow down from a
separate spiritual power to a corporeal being, just as the separated prime
mover is the cause of movement in the first mobiles. In the same way,
the separable rational soul can perform its normal function in the body
while remaining essentially an immortal substance.
When he came to the structure of the soul, Albert also reasoned with
the logic of immortality as an ulterior intention. For him the soul is a
simple substance, and though it is also vegetative, sensitive and rational,
all these powers exist in the soul only potentially as a triangle exists
potentially in a rectangle. Just as the potential existence of triangles in a
rectangle does not compromise the nature of the latter, so the presence in
the soul of the sensitive, vegetative powers in the rational soul does not
compromise the substantial unity of the soul.
In relation to the unity of the soul, Albert distinguished three types of
wholeness. The first is tatum universale, exemplified in the universal
which applies to many individual, concrete things. The second is tatum
integrale, the wholeness of a thing composed of integral parts. None of
these two explains the unity of the soul which is rather understood as
tatum potentiale, midway between tatum universale and integrale. The
soul is completely present in each of its faculties, as it is appropriate for
a tatum universale, yet each of these faculties can, in a certain manner,
b~ named a soul. The soul carmot also be dismembered; as it is possible
Wlth a tatum integra/e, but it is at the same time true that its perfection is
not realized completely in any of its faculties.
Albert used the analogy of political power to explain the unity
between the vegetative, sensitive and rational soul. In a political entity,
the highest authority embraces the power of subordinate officials as it is
the ultimate unity of power that makes a political entity what it is: Much
in the same way, he tried to unite the diverse powers that the soul
possesses in one indivisible substantial entity. Isolated, the powers of
the soul are no more than accidents, with the impllcation that what
13
14
15
possible intellect that has reached the level of the universal becomes
intellectus adeptus, which, being the repository of pure knowledge, is
immortal and perpetual. The possible intellect which is mixed up with
the sensible, inasmuch as it makes use of reminiscence, is corruptible.
But considered as a part of an indivisible soul, it is incorruptible.
However, it is the state of intellectus adeptus, with its possession of
perfect knowledge and contemplation, that is the root of inunortality. It
is in that state that the soul is able to obtain felicity post mortem. 53
For Albert, the agent intellect, as the efficient cause of knowledge,
makes what is potentially intelligible to be actually so. In its process of
perfection, the possible intellect continually receives the light of the
agent. Abstraction involves the continuous illumination of the' possible
intellect by the agent. This illumination, which takes place within the
soul, is made possible because the agent intellect is pure intelligibility,
having in itself the ideal form of all things. Indeed the real nature of the
agent intellect is no more than the totality of all these forms. In a way,
therefore, the illumination of the possible by the agent intellect is not
much more than the reception of the agent by the possible. Only when
the reception is total, that is to say, when the possible becomes the agent
S4
intellect can the latter become adeptus and at the same time become the
ground of inunortality. Why then did Albert say that all natural
knowledge begins from the senses if indeed the agent intellect possesses
a priori the ideal forms of all things? The answer is that for Albert these
fonus do not exist in a distinctive manner in the agent intellect, and the
phantasms are therefore necessary for their detennination; otherwise,
these forms will be received as undifferentiated by the possible intellect.
The mainly Aristotelian noetics that is outlined above is very much
tempered when Albert later emphasized divine intervention in the
knowledge of supernatural objects," and also the insufficiency of the
light of the agent intellect in abstraction." But from the brief outline of
some of the theories we can see that Albert's philosophy, especially his
philosophical psychology, can be described as a seam of different
doctrines, which on completion naturally grows into the immortality of
the soul. His explanation of the metaphysical structure of the soul, his
theory about the perfection of the intellect, and also his statement that
man as man is in fact only the intellect are all geared towards the defence
of the doctrine of immortality.
1.4 Some Trends in the Defence of Immortality before St. Thomas
16
17
being that has the two qualities must also have at least two components,
from one of which it derives actual existence. It can thus be said that if
the soul is not composed it will not admit of corruption, since it will not
possess the actuality of persistence together with the potentiality of
destruction. In beings that are composed, the potentiality of corruption
is due to their material component and not to their substance as such.
Therefore the assertion that all that is generated is subject to corruption
due to its finltude is applicable only to beings composed of matter and
fonn.
Of course, the kernel of Avicennats argument is found here and there
in many writers, especially in the fonn of the assertion that the soul has
no material component, and that destruction is due to contraries in
matter.
dear to such thinkers as William of Auvergne. But no one went into any
detailed explanations of Avicenna, leaving the bland assertion of
incorruptibility on account of matter with the uncertainty of its origin.
18
19
20
21
what he called rah'ones commune and rationes proprie, but was silent on
the criteria for his grouping and on the relative weight he assigned to
each of the groups. Only Albert the Great made clear distinctions on the
convincing power of his arguments. In the Summa de creaturis, he
named autoritate philosophorum, and later divided his arguments into
signs (signa) of immortality, probable, and necessary arguments. In the
De natura, his discourse is merely entitled "Necessary arguments in
defence of immortality." It is instructive that many of the proofs
designated as signum and as probable arguments are used by other
writers of his rlme without any specific designation. Thomas Aquinas
was not to follow Albert's innovation in this matter, but we are to see that
some of the trends we have seen in the defence of immortality in the
early thirteenth century are abundantly replicated in his own philosophy.
1.5 The Issue of Latin Averroism
The above trends do not indicate that the prethomistic thirteenth
century masters had any interest in explaining what type of inunortality
they were talking about. There is hardly any single author of the time
who as much as tried to define the term inunortality, nor tried to show
even obliquely how the term is to be understood in relation to the human
soul. The need was to show that the soul must be inunortal, and the
understanding and reception of new theories were tailored by this need.
It was therefore enough that there was any sign, any believable inflection
of doctrine which would add to the conflrmation of this doctrine already
taken to be certain on grounds of Christian religious convictions. The
question of which type of inunortality that answers the need of
philosophical proofs would be more clearly raised in the second half of
the century, and it would be a question which not only affected
profoundly the academic community, but also Aquinas' treatment of the
question of the soul, and specifically its immortality. The problem arose
in the context of the upsurge of the movement which has come to be
known as Averroism. 77
The background to the problem of Averroism in the thirteenth century
is the continued assimilation of the new sources of learning. In spite of
the fact that the ban of 1210 was not lifted a host of thinkers both in the
faculties of arts and theology continued the utilization of the available
works of Aristotle including the libri naturales. A prominent thinker
indeed such tendencies were corporeal, other animals would also possess
them. It follows that whatever pines for the honourable and the material
does not depend on the body. Consequently the rational soul does not
depend on the body and does not perish.
The obvious weakness of some of these proofs points to the state of
the philosophical development of the age, and the failure of the thinkers
to resolve conflicting theories into a coherent system. Their discourses
especially their arguments, are not however to be taken in isolatio~
because the authors did not seem to have taken them as such. Their
method was rather to call to witness any conceivable principle, theory Or
saying deemed to be generally acceptable, and to draw from such the
conclusions that could be shown to speak for immortality. This is why
most of the authors did not weigh the strength or weakness of the
22
like Albert the Great was to declare his intention of making all the works
of Aristotle intelligible to the Latins. There was no donbt thet the ban on
Aristotle was a rule kept in the breach, and even with the confirmation of
the ban, together with the statutes of the University of Paris in 1263 by
Pope Urban IV," none was left in doubt that the ban had become an
anachronism. In 1252, the English nation at Paris included in its
programme required reading of Aristotle's De anima,79 which Roger
Bacon had been reading years before then. When therefore the
remodelled programme of arts imposed all the known works of Aristotle
as obligatory reading in 1255, it was not doing more than confirming the
facts that were already on the groWld. 80 It was obvious thet the more
conscious and reactionary tendency in the university was losing out to
I
,
23
24
25
NOTES
26
See Philip the Chancellor, Summa de Bono, ed. N. Wicld (Bern: Franke,
1985), 265 - 277; John of La Rochelle, Summa de anima. ed. J. C. Bougerol
(paris: J. Vrin, 1985), 1. 42.
10
Alexander of Hales, Questiones disputate, ed. Doucet (Quaracchi: St.
Bonaventure College, 1960), 1. 32.
II For Odo Rigaldus' text on inunortality, see S. Vanni Rovigbi, L'immortalita
delf'anima ne; maestri francescani del secolo XIII (Milan: Vita et Pensiero,
1936), pp. 241 - 248.
12 See St. Bonaventure's conunentary on the Book of Sentences of Peter
Lombard (Quaracchi: St. Bonaventure's College), 19 v. 2, p. 457 - 461.
13 _ Albert the Great, De natura et origine animae, opera omnia, v. xn, ed. B.
Geyer (Aschendorf: Milosler, 1955), II, c. 6 pp. 25 - 28; Summa de creafuris,
ed. Borgnet (paris, 1894), II, q. 59, a. 2; De anima, Opera omnia. v. vn, ed. C.
Stroick (Aschendorf: Miloster, 1986), ill, 3, c. 13.
14 William of Auvergne, De immortalite animae, ed. G. BUlow, Beitriige, II, 3
(MUnster, 1897), pp. 39 - 61; De anima, opera omnia, II, Suppl., (1674,
reprinted, Frankfwt a. M: Minerva, 1963), pp. 65 - 226
IS F. Van Steenbergben, Aristotle in the West, tr. L. J. Johnston (Louvain: E.
Nauwe1aerts, 1970), pp. 32 -33.
16 De anima, II, ii, 22: "Theologus habet inquirere qua via contingat animam
mereri et demereri, et quid sit ad salutem quid ad penam. Quid autem anima sit,
et in quo predicamento sit, et qualiter infundatur corpori, non habet ipse
inquirere. Ex quo ista scire magis pertinet ad alium artificem. Ex quo ergo
theologus solum habet docere qual iter sit merendum et demerendum, non habet
ipse proprie do cere quid sit anima nee quid sit eius essentia."
17 Timaeus, 41b - 42b
\8 C. Steel, "Plato Latinus (1939 - 1989)," in J. Hamesse & M. Fatrori (eds.),
Recontres des cultures dans la philosophie mediivale (Louvain-la-Neuve: I. S.
20
27
Niewohner and L. Slurlese (eds.), (Ziirich: Spur Verlag" 1994), pp. 201 - 203.
39 William of Auvergne, De anima, v. 3, 114b: "Nec praetereundus est hic
error Alexandri quo insanissime deliravit de natura et originae animae
humanae, dicens eam oriri et esse ex contemperantia elementorum, ac si diceret
ex bonitate cornplexionis tanquam ex conjuctione ipsorurn qui per illud dicitur
28
29
49
30
56
cr.
31
81
32
Chapter 2
IMMORTALITY AND AQUINAS'
CONCEPTION OF THE HUMAN SOUL
Chapter I shows, among other things, that the teaching of the socalled Latin Averroists was of great concern to Thomas Aquinas, for it
touches on mmt can be viewed in many ways as one of his greatest
contributions to philosophicalleanting. More than all his ancestors in
the philosophical enterprise, Aquinas not only works with the common
acceptance of Aristotle the philosopher among his contemporaries, he is
singularly the first to follow the consequences of his interpretation of
Aristotle, \\hlle struggling, sometimes, successfully, and sometimes not
so successfully, to bring these in accord with the tenets of his faith. The
driving motive of Thomas is his enduring conviction that when properly
exercised, reason or philosophy cannot but confonn to the truth of
faith.' The great difficulties encountered in such a grand project are
most clearly seen in his effort to bring to bear the instrwnent of
Aristotle's philosophy on the understanding of the human soul. That
effort is bedevilled by the almost impossible mission to confonn
Aristotle to the accepted views of man and his soul, and consequently,
the outcome retains a great deal of the ambivalence characteristic of the
thirteenth century reception of Aristotle. Aquinas may have shared a
great deal of this ambivalence, but however the result of his synthesis is
judged, it can easily be seen that, set against the background in which
he worked, his work remains monumental, and in all the history of
philosophy, his achievement is one that not many figures can boast of
marching.
The man of Thomas Aquinas is a composite of body and soul,
matter and fonn, like all material substances in hylemorphic
composition. The thirteenth century was heir to the two opposed
34
35
36
that species. It means that in the case of man, just as it belongs to the
nature of the individual man to have a soul, and a body, the materiality
that is characteristic of his body must enter into the conception of
man. 11
37
38
who while squarely against the Platonic understanding of man, did not
completely succeed, as we shall see later, in extricating himself from
the most fundamental strand of Platonism. Man is a distinctive nature,
but his distinctiveness is constituted by his rationality, which is owed to
the soul in the final analysis. The proper activity of man as man is the
act of understanding. 23 It is not because he has a body that he is a man,
it is not because of his incomnuullcability, nor because of his
substantiality that he is a person, for brute animals also possess these
qualities. The fact is that man is man because he reasons and
understands, so that for Aquinas, the very being of man is to
understand. If man has one nature, one being, and this being is
intrinsically linked with the quality of spirituality, it follows then that
39
40
41
42
act of man by virtue of his essence. The only possibility is that the
intellect, \\hich is the principle of understanding, is united to the body
of man as form. For Aquinas, this seems to make understandable the
intrinsic unity of the intellectual acts to man. It also obviates the need
for assuming that the principle of understanding (the soul) is the whole
person.
The conclusion reached by drawing the consequence of the human
act of understanding is further confirmed by the consideration of the
nature of the human species. 3S The nature of each being is known
through its activity, and what is peculiar to man, what makes him a
member of a specific species is that he can understand. It is the most
characteristic of all the activities of man, and, according to Aristotle,
that through \\hich his ultimate happiness is attainable. It follows that
the source of such an activity should be the defining principle of man, a
form making it possible for him to belong to a determinate species.
The soul is therefore the substantial form in man, or more precisely,
the form of the body. It is not only the source of its life activities, but
also of its being. This position will most naturally lead to the
clarification of other issues, including the unity or otherwise offorms in
man, and also how precisely the soul is related to the body as form,
\\hich will in turn touch on some problems in relation to death.
However, it is remarkable that Aquinas undertakes to provide solutions
to the problems instead of seeking a simple escape route, as indeed a
thinker like Albert the Great had done, by adopting Platonic view of
man, \\hich provides a good foundation for the defence of immortality.
However, it is not to be forgotten that if indeed Aquinas held to
Aristotelian hylemorphism in the soul-body union, it is because he was
firmly convinced that immortality could still be defended from such a
background. The series of doubts he puts in the mouth of his objectors"
show that he is well aware that his theory "strains the form-matter
principle of the Aristotelian physics and metaphysics."" And more: that
the form-matter principle when applied to the human soul and body
"strains" the doctrine of immortality. This awareness explains his
concern to stress what is in his view the specificity of the soul, even
while emphasizing hylemorphic composition. Hence afier arguing for
the soul as form of the body from the point of view of the species of
43
Being so high, the power of the human soul so transcends matter that it
has activities in which matter does not participate at all; the power of
understanding is responsible for this act.
The content of this paragraph fits in very well with Aquinas'
philosophy, and is repeated in several other passages of his work,39 but
coming in this case just afier a defence of the soul as form against the
positions of Plato and Averroes, it would seem out of place, if not
understood as a dress rehearsal, for the defence of immortality. There
appears to be some fear that the link between the body and the soul,
which Aquinas has consistently argued for in the long chapter, would
be submerged in the general Aristotelian conception of form-matter
relationship, and therefore the reader requires a reminder of the special
status of the soul as the highest. of forms, which, dominating matter
most completely, has the power of carrying on activities independent of
matter. Even though the move from the total domination of matter to
activities completely transcendent of matter is not logically warranted,
to be noted is that the aim of Aquinas' passage is to underline the
capital that he makes of the power of understanding in the nature of the
rational soul. The same power is again raised, and for the same purpose
in the discussion of the subsistence of the soul.
The question of subsistence is evidently closely linked with that of
44
subsistence.41
45
of Aquinas' work were treated later. Such, for instance, is the insistence
that before the proof of subsistence, the soul was only known not to be
material, but not yet a form. The reality is that Aquinas outlines his
points in a sort of backward and forward movement. Many points are
repeated, ahnost ad nauseam, others, which are presupposed in
previous arguments, are later argued for specifically. The difficulties of
such critics as Kelly would be avoided if the particular doctrine were
viewed in the context of the whole philosophy. Still it is not being
suggested that if this is done, all the difficulties raised will peter out.
The unity which Aquinas insists on as regards human nature and the
relationship between body and soul is also found in the relationship of
the different types of activities as they are found in the human
46
47
48
fonns may not be necessary, and therefore the rational soul does not
have to come into the body already formed by the sentient as colour to
a surface, or that, with reference to the second argument, that it may not
need to wait till the body is made a subsistent substance to be joined to
it. Even so, the question of unity poses itself, and Aquinas, considering
the question of what could possibly make the many souls, concludes
that their unity must be the unity of an aggregate of things which are
many absolutely speaking, and one only relatively.
A consideration independent of the consequences of assuming
Plato's view to be true is the attempt to prove the singularity of the form
in man by the statement that diverse powers not arising from the same
principle do not hinder one another in their act, but that diverse
operations of the soul hinder one another, for when one is intense, the
other is hindered. This is used as a point to show that in fact all the
powers of the soul are essentially rooted in the same principle. Even
though this point is repeated in several passages, there is hardly any
explanation given to what is meant, and in the Q. D. de anima, he adds
to it the statement that there is in man an overflowing of one power into
another, which proves the same point of common origin of the powers.
The issue of one power hindering another could be traced to as far
back as Dominic GWldissalinus' De immortalitate animae in which the
weakening of the body in such phenomena as ecstasy and prophecy is
used t? show that the soul is most active when the body is weakened,
and WIll therefore be all the more alive when removed completely from
the body." Hindering one another in Aquinas' sense would mean that
when the intellect is most active, for instance, the concentration of the
senses would be much less. It is possible, for example, for a person
deep in contemplation to be seen to be physically gazing at an object
which in fact he is not perceiving. This raises the whole issue of
subliminal perception, but it is doubtful whether such an example can
be terme? .~ impediment of the sense by the understanding. Again,
some actIVItIes of the human composite, like the nutritive ones, have
many .asp~cts ~at are unconscious, going on relentlessly so long as the
orgamsm IS ahve and has no malfunction. Is it conceivable that with the
intensity of the understanding or sensing the activities of the vegetative
49
prominently, Bonaventure.
Thomas rejects this theoryS6 because the soul as form must either be
so wholly or in part, but if it is wholly form, it cannot have matter in its
being since the very notion of form excludes materiality. If, on the other
hand, it is conceded that only part of such a soul is form, while the rest
is matter, then it is only the part that is form which can be rightly called
a soul, and the matter it is joined with will receive the primacy ?f the
actuation of the principle of actuality. It means that if the meamng of
form and its relation with matter in Aristotle's metaphysics is well
understood, there is no way, even taking the issue logically, that the
soul can have matter in it. In fact, as J. de Vries says, for Thomas all
that have form and matter are bodies. 57 Second, Aquinas goes back to
the operation of the soul, asserting once again that the nature of a thing
is known by the way it operates. If so, we can know the nature of the
soul by its cognitive activities. The soul knows things immediately and
absolutely in such a way that the form of the thing known is in the soul.
Were the soul composed of matter and form, things would be known
only in their individuality and not as forms, in which case the soul
50
51
would know only singular and particular things. This for Aquinas is
surely not the case.
The foregoing argument makes no distinction between the matter
that is present in the composition of the soul, and the nonnal matter that
is the object of our sensitive knowledge. It is however doubtful whether
outside the materialists of ancient philosophy, any thinker known to
Aquinas would count the rational soul as a citizen of the world of
beings characterized by the qualities which Aquinas is presupposing in
the foregoing refutation. The designation spiritual matter in itself
speaks for this supposition. Aquinas is perhaps assunting that in any
way matter is understood, it must in some way be reducible to surface,
to weight, and to quantity. But certainly, Bonaventure, for instance,
would not accept that spiritual matter has any of these qualities.
Thomas accepted the quod est and quo est composition in answer to the
objection that only God is purely actual, and that hence other
subsistence spiritual creatures must have matter as the basis of their
potentiality." These descriptions traceable to Boethius were much used
before Thomas as an answer to the same problem. 59 Albert the Great
took it up, in his distinction between suppositum and form. Gilson is of
the view that whatever Albert understands as suppositum, it essentially
plays the same role as spiritual matter in those who uphold hylemorphic
composition in the soul. If so, does the same comment not apply to the
quod est of Thomas, among other thinkers of the thirteenth century, and
does the whole problem not lie in the use of the terminology spiritual
matter? Again, the whole thought of Albert on the soul, including the
attempt to replace spiritual matter by the term suppositum, is tailored to
suit immortality, and the same can be said with regard to Aquinas.
f,
52
53
conceived as being wholly in t."e body, and given that the concept of
whole implies divisibility into smaller entities, one can also think of
three ways such wholeness can be divisible. A whole is either divisible
into quantitative, conceptual or functional parts. Quantitative division
can apply only to such forms as whiteness, which still remains
whiteness in each section of a dismembered white table. In this case,
the division of fonn is per accidens. The second type of wholeness and
its parts would apply to a species and its principles: matter and form,
genus and difference. The third type of wholeness applies to the active
and passive powers that a being possesses which can be taken in the
sense of parts of the whole in so far as these operations are manifested
in diverse ways. It is only in the last two ways of being whole and part
that the soul can also be said to be in the whole of the human body and
its parts. While the soul is in the whole and in each part, it is
inconceivable that all its powers are realized in each part of the body. If
it were so, that would mean that the eyes can smell and the ears can
hear. On the contrary, Aquinas says that the soul's power of sight is in
the eye, and hearing in the ear (secundum visum in oculo, secundum
auditum in aure)." The power of the soul is realized in each part
according to the specific perfection of each of these parts.
One vital function which the body performs for the soul is that the
body serves to mark the distinction between souls, and thus designate
them as individuals. This is indeed a very important function since
forms of the same species are not distingnishable by their specific
difference. The fact that souls are the first perfections of organic bodies
does not make them differ one from the other, for, in this respect, they
are all equal and indistinguishable. In his theory of individuation of the
'soul, Aquinas followed a lead given by Avicerma, though the specific
context of the two theories on individuation is quite different. Avicenna
argued against the pre-existence of the soul on the grounds that if the
soul existed before the creation of the body, there is no way one soul
can be distinguished from the other given that the essence of the soul is
one for all. It would therefore be impossible to have a multiplicity of
souls if we presuppose their existence before the body.66 For him, the
factors which individuate rational souls are either their quiddity, their
relation with matter, or the causes which detemtine their material
existence. As there is no difference of quiddity in the soul, the cause of
their differentiation must be sought in the particular body to which each
soul is attached. Each soul begins to exist as soon as the body fit for it
is created, the body fit to serve as its instrument," for which it has a
yearning (affectio) to be united. This inclination of the soul for a
54
particular body continues forever," even after the death of the body,
i.e. after the soul has lost its body.
Aviceuna follows this theory of individuation even though he was
far from being as radical as Aquinas in applying the full implication of
the conception of the soul as form. So, for Avicenna, soul and body
constitute two substances, not one, even though he did accept the
definition of the soul as form of the body. For Aquinas, just as for
Aviceuna, it is matter that is the principle of individuation. Thus the
soul owes its individuality to its union with the body. It is because a
particular soul is adaRted to a particular body that it is different from
the rest of the souls, ' such that in Aquinas' philosophy angels which
are spiritual beings without bodies do not form one species, since there
is no way of differentiating them. Each angel must therefore be the lone
55
56
of the reasons why many authors of the thirteenth century rallied round
in defence of the immortality of the soul. Aquinas attacks the teaching
of Alexander in many passages. 73 Moslem peripatetics were also not
happy with the interpretation given by Alexander. Avicenna tried to fit
in the doctrine of the agent intellect with the doctrine of emanation,
which came to be a trademark of Moslem peripatetics. On top of the
emanationist scale is found God himself, who is responsible for all
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
pay attention to the life, both of the intellect and the will. 94 As the
intellect is naturally glued to knowledge as its actualization, so is the
will to happiness, and therefore human beings are inevitably moved by
the quest for happiness or well-being. If this aspect of the ,quest of the
will looks detenninistic, one must take aCCO'lUlt of Aquinas' insistence
that there is no determination as to the specific means of seeking that
happiness." Man is free as regards the determining aspects of volition.
By freedom Aquinas means free decision or free judgement (liberium
arbitriurn). The link between the two aspects of the soul's basic powers
or faculties is very close, since it is the intellect which enlightens the
soul on possible options available for the attainment of an end, while
the will provides the drive that issues in desire and decision, and
striving in view of that end through a chosen means. In this regard, the
question of which of the two is of greater importance is basically
polemic, as each in its proper aspect is an essential power of the same
unitary human soul, and each is indispensable for its being and
operations.
It must however be underlined that all the arguments Aquinas used
to explain the soul's nature are one way or another linked with the
power of understanding which the soul can exercise. The implication
of this power is also traceable to the doctrine of the soul as form, and as
subsistent; the question of plurality of form; the position of the soul in
the body; hylemorphic composition of the soul; the whole issue of the
unity of the intellect, and whether it exists outside the human composite
or not. Aquinas' theory is based on the principle that operation follows
from essence, and thus from the activities of beings we are enabled to
gain knowledge of their nature.
Following closely the theory of Aristotle, Aquinas holds that all
human knowledge is derived from sense experience. By this he rejects
not only all Platonic epistemology according to which our knowledge
of constant truth is derived from another world wherein exist the
constancy and certainty we see in knowledge;' but also turns his back
on the Augustinian theory of illumination according to which the
human soul depends on direct illumination from beyond, at least for
knowledge of every reality that is above the sensible. This theory that
very much suits the defence of immortality and independence of the
rational soul was the standard epistemological doctrine among the
thinkers of the thirteenth century" and Aquinas is, perhaps, the first
Christian philosopher to accept in full the theory of Aristotle about the
terrestrial origin of human knowledge.
64
65
objects. Real existents are in fact only particular, so that the universal
man that can be predicated of Socrates and of Plato is not .an
independent man. From individual human beings, it is possible for Q,\1i6
..
intellect to abstract the most common characteristics that map men . ,
into members of the same species. Such a similarity in the essenti~1 .
nature of each man with that of all other men is what constitutes the
basis of the universal man in the intellect.!01 The acquisition of the
knowledge of universals is the culmination of two distinct but
intrinsically related acts or levels of cognitive operation.
The sensible species received through external objects by the senses
are transmitted into the internal senses. But sensaton is not just.
physical, but rather psycho-physical because mere physical alteration
does not suffice for the generation of impressions. 102 The interior senses
synthesize the various "patches of sensation derived from the external
ll
objects. These species are in turn collated by the sensus communis, and
are conserved by the phantasia and the imagination. It is at this point
that the work of conversion. of particular sensible species to universal
and intelligible species really starts. The power of the intellect that is
responsibe for the transition is the agent or active intellect. The human
soul is usually in potency of knowledge, so that the agent intellect is
necessary to act on the phantasms of the sense level. Again, Aquinas
maintains that no material species can have. any effect or rather impress
itself on an immaterial being.!03 It is thanks to the agent intellect that
the universal nature of species which are in the phantasia in their
particular determination is sieved from the phantasm. This is called
abstraction. 104 The result of abstraction is the intelligible species which
is the proper object of the possible intellect. The active intellect thus
transmits the intelligible species to the possible intellect which knows
them as universals. It does not however mean that the two levels of
knowledge diverge diametrically at this point. While the possible
intellect is in the possession of universal natures, it is also capable of
knowing the particular. This is again achieved by reference to the
phantasm.!OS Indeed the knowledge of the particular in the phantasm is
the first order of knowledge. It is only from the particular that the .
intellect abstracts the universal that can be predicated of the several
members of the same species. "The universal concept is primarily the
modification of the intellect by which a thing is known according to its
form or essence. 1I106 This implies that the senses as well as the intellect
have knowledge of the external individual objects, While the senses
have only particular specific knowledge of these, the intellect possesses
the knowledge of universals in addition to the ability to subsume a
66
67
with what is, it can be said to be true or false. Hence, for Aquinas, truth
is primarily in the mind. But we must not forget that it is not in the
intellect as a physical objective presence. Rather it is like a mental
state, a state of conformity of the judgement of the intellect with reality.
As such truth belongs to the intellect. It is so because, even though the
sense has a correspondence between itself and the thing sensed, it lacks
the distance to be able to make a judgement of that which can only be
true or false. The mind, on the other hand, has the ability not only to
apprehend intelligible species, but also to make judgement about what
it understands.
Given the capital Aquinas makes of the operational independence of
the intellect in understanding, one may inquire at what point do the
senses, both external and internal, cease to participate in the act of
intellectual knowledge? The begirming of the act of sensation may
indeed be only physiological, but the recognition of an object as this or
that involves a judgement which cannot be described as purely sensory,
since it involves bringing some particular perception under a universal
species to which it belongs. Again, according to Aquinas, the phantasm
is very much involved in the application of the universal essence or
quiddity which the soul derives from the act of the agent intellect by
abstraction from particular nature. However, this act of reference to the
phantasm may not constitute the participation of the sensory in
intellectual cognition. The paradigmatic act of the intellect, sciencia
does not involve a reference to the sensory particular or image. Again,
the act of judgement which constitutes truth, and the inferential process
of drawing from prior cognition new consequences for intellectual
enricinnent may not involve a throw-back to the particular and the
material. Yet, despite Aquinas' constant use of the understanding in an
attempt to vindicate the peculiar nature of the soul, human knowledge
in the soul is a whole process that is so tightly interconnected that each
level is of vital importance in bringing the human intellect from its
potency to actuality. The insistence on the special nature of the soul
does not therefore diminish the importance of sensory image or
phantasm, as he rightly emphasized in the De Trinitilate.!07
wading through them with all the arsenal of his reasoning and the
thorough knowledge of sources available to men of his epoch. As
Kreyche says, no one can say that he is "a coward who refuses to face
issues.,,!08 Aquinas tackles such difficult issues as the doctrine of the
soul as form and as subsistent, and which while being subsistent,
contains no matter in its nature, even the so-called spiritual matter. The
soul is intimately linked with the body, so inthnately in fact that it is
metaphysically bound up with the body, yet the body exists for the sake
of the soul from which it derives life. The materiality of the body does
not necessarily mean that the soul that serves as its substantial form
must be submerged in matter, and there is no need to foist an intellect
separate and unique in order to ensure a certain kind of immaterality
and immortality for the soul. Aquinas assumes the full consequence of
his understanding of Aristotle, to the extent that all human knowledge
begins with the senses, but then goes on to a level which enables him to
argue for the "right" of the intellect to be granted exception in the world
of form/matter relationship. Whether all his positions as regards the
nature and the activities of the soul are defensible is altogether another
matter. The boldness of his efforts is not in doubt. It is from the
background which is briefly outlined above that he goes on to argue for
immortality in several of his works. To some of these arguments we
NOTES
I R. Reyna "On the Soul: A Philosophical Exploration of the Active Intellect
in Averroes, Aristotle aod Aquinas, The Thomist 36 (1972), p. 149.
2
3
68
4 Injoan. Evang. XIX,S, 15 (p.L., 35, 1553). The description of the Wlion of
soul and body as one man or one person is still consistent with the Neoplatonic
position whereby the real person is in fact the soul. It could for instance be a
way of expressing that there is only one soul, one man, one person in the whole
outcome of the body~soul relation that is in the human being.
per ipsum. Cum igitur corpus bumanum organicmn sit quod est dicere
instrumentaie, imo cum sit instrumentum Wlum ad multas operationes aptum,
natum et fabricatum necesse est operationem esse cui naturaliter serviat, quique
eo naturaliter uti debeat."
8 Ibid., p. 102 a.
, S.C.G., II, 57, 3, 6; cf. also S. T., la. 75, 3. "Sed Aristoteles posuit quod
solum intelligere, inter opera animae, sine organo eorporeo exereetur. Sentire
vero et consequentes operationes animae sensitivae manifeste aecidunt cwn
aliqua corporis inununitatione, sicut in videndo inunutatur pupilla per speciem
coloris (et idem apparet in aliis). Et sie manifestum est quod anima sensitiva
non habet aliquam operationem propriam per seipsam, sed onmis operatio
sensitivae animae est conjuncti. n
10 S. C. G., II, 57, 10
II
S. T., 1a. 75, 4: "Nam ad naturam speciei pertinet id quod significat
definitio. Definitio autem in rebus naturalibus non significat formam tantum,
sed formam et materiam, unde materia est pars speciei in rebus naturalibus; non
quidem materia signata, quae est principium individuationis, sed materia
communis. Sicut enim de ratione hujus hominis est quod sit ex anima et
camibus et ossibus. Oportet enim de substantia speciei esse quiquid est
communiter de substantia omnium individuorwn sub specie contentorwn."
12 L. Elders, The Philosophy of Nature of St. Thomas Aquinas (Frankfurt a.
M.: Peter Lang, 1997), pp. 339 - 340. For a study of the idea of man as
microcosm in thirteenth century philosophy, see 1. McEvoy, "Philosophical
Developments of the Microcosm and the Macrocosm in the Thirteenth
Century," in C. Wenin (ed.), L 'homme et son universe au Moyen-Age, v. 1
(Louvain-Ia-Neuve: Institut SupCrieur de Philosophle 1986), pp. 374 - 381.
13
S. C. G., II, 46, 2; 3:- "Oportet igitur, ad consununatam universi
perfectionem, esse aliquas creaturas quae in Deum redirent non solwn
secWldwn naturae similitudinem, sed etiam per operationem. Quae quidem non
potest esse nisi per actum intellectus et vohmtatis: quia nec ipse Deus aliter
ergo seipswn operationem habet. Oportet igitur, ad perfectionem optimam
universi, esse aliquas creaturas intellectuales."
14 S. C. G. 11,45,8.
" S. C. G. II, 91,4.
16 G. Verbeke, "Man as Frontier" in Aquinas and the Problems of his Time
(Louvain: Louvain University Press, 1976), pp. 204 - 223.
69
17 For instance, Philip the Chancellor used many nuances of the order of being
to spin many arguments for immortality in his Summa de bono.(269 - 276) St.
Albert the Great used the same as the necessary arguments for immortality in
the Summa de creaturis (II, q. 59). For an analysis of these arguments, see J.
O. Oguejiofor, The Arguments for the Immortality o/the Soul in the First Half
ojthe'Thirteenth Century, pp.186 - 206, 345 - 358.
IS S. T., la. 29, I
19 See J. Owens, "The Unity in a Thomistic Philosophy of Man," Mediaeval
Studies, 25 (1963), pp. 63 - 64.
" M.-J. Nicholas, "Le corps humain," Revue thomiste, 79 (1979), p. 358
21 J. Owens, op. cit., p. 70.
22 L. Elders, op. cit., p. 220
23 F. J. Crosson, "Psyche and Persona: The Problem of Personal Immortality,"
International Philosophical Quarterly, 8 (1968), p. 169.
24 M.- J. Nicholas. ''Le corps hurnain," p. 374: "11. n'est rien dans retre
hwnain, si materiel que cela paraisse, qui ne soit hwnain en lui parce
qu'intrinseqement ordOlUle it l'esprit." See also A. C. Pegis, "Man as Nature
and Spirit," Doctor communis 20 (1951), p. 56: "The totality of the composite
called man cannot be more than an intellectual nature."
2S A. C. Pegis, "Between Immortality and Death: Some Further Reflections on
the Summa Contra Gentiles," The Monist 58 (1974), p. 3.
26 S. T., lao 76, 5: "cum fonna non sit propter materiam sed potius materia
propter formam, ex forma oportet rationem accipere quare materia sit tali-s, et
non e converso. to Ibid., 77. 6: "minus principale est propter principalius,
materia est propter fonnam substantia."
27 S. T. lao 75, 1. See also, N. Kretzmann & E. Stump, eds., The Cambridge
Companion to Aquinas (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp.
128 - 131.
28 Cf. Aristotle, De anima, n, 1, 412a 29, S. T, la, 76, 1, Q. D. de anima, I,
ad. 15.
29 Cf. Aristotle, Metaphysics, tr. H. TrendelUlick (Cambridge M A: Harvard
University Press, 1948) V. vii, 4: "Thus it follows that "substance" hal two
senses: the ultimate subject, which cannot be further predicated of something
else; and whatever has an individual separate existence. The shape and form of
each particular thing is of this nature." Aquinas is evidently not laying claim to
the second meaning of substance in reference to the soul. Aristotle also makes
clear what he understands by substance in the real sense, by, for instance
distinguishing between primary and second&y substance. "Substance in the
truest and strictest, primary sense of that term, is that which is neither asserted
of nor can be found in a subject." "Evetything else but first substance is either
affinned of first substance or present in such as its subject." Catogries, tr. H.
Cooke (Cambridge M A: Harvard University Press, 1938), pp. 19, 21.
30
S. C. G., II, 68, 3 :"Ad hoc enim quod aliquid sit fonna substantialis
alterius, duo requiruntur. Quorwn unum est, ut forma sit principiwn essendi
substantialiter ei cuius est forma: principiwn autem dico, non factivum, sed
70
fonnale, quo aliquid est et denominatur ens. Unde sequitur aliod, scilicet quod
forma et materia conveniant in uno esse .... Et hoc esse est in quo subsistit
71
S. T., la, 75, 2, res: "Manifestum est enim quod homo per intellectum
cognoscere potest naturas omnium corpomm. Quod autem potest cognoscere
aliqua oportet ut nihil eorum habeat in sua natura, quia illud quod inesset ei
naturaliter impediret cognitionem alionun, sicut videmus quod lingua infinni
quae infecta est cholerico et amaro humore non potest percipere aliquid dulce,
sed omnia videntur ei amara. Si igitur principium intellectuale haberet in se
naturam alicujus corporis, non posset omnia corpora cognoscere. Omne autem
corpus habet aliquam naturam detenninatam. Impossibile est igitur quod
principium intellectuale sit corpus. Et similiter impossibile est quod intelligat
per organwn corporeum, quia etiam natura determinata iHius organi corporei
prohiberet cognitionem omnium corporum."
41 Loc. cit.: "Ipsum igitur intellectualle principium":'quod dicitur- mens vel
intellectus habet operationem per se cui non comnl'lUlicat corpus. Nihil autem
potest per se operari nisi quod per se subsistit. .."
42 M. Kelly, "Aquinas and the Subsistence of the Soul: Notes on a Difficulty,"
Franciscan Studies 27 (1967), pp. 213 '219.
43 In III De anima vii, 680.
44 M. Kelly, op. cit., p. 219.
4~ cr. S. T., 1a 75, 2.
46 D. A Callus, "The Problem of the Plurality of Fonn in the Thirteenth
Centwy: The Thomist Innovation," in L 'homme et son destin d'apres les
penseurs du moyen age," (Louvain: Nauwelaerts, 1960), p. 577. See also ''The
Origin of the Problem of the Unity of Fonn," The Thomist24 (1961),257
285.
47 De anima, II, 3. 414bI932. Cf. S. T. la, 76, 3.
48
Jolm of La Rochelle, Summa de anima, 1.24 : "similis est proportio
vegetativi ad sensitivum, sensitivi ad rationale, sicut triangu1i ad
quadrangulum, et quadranguli ad pentagonum; quia sicut triangulus in
quadrangulo, et quadrangulus in pentag()'no, ita vegetativum in sensitivo, et
sensitivum in rationali. Sed cum triangulus in quadrangulo non differat
secWldum substantiam, inuno idem SWlt secundum substantiam; ergo
vegetabile cum sensitivo, et utnunque cum rationali non differunt secWldum
substantiam...
49 E. A. Moody, op. cit., 48.
~o William of Auvergne, De anima, p. 108a-b: " ... si pluralitas atque diversitas
operationum sufficeret facere debere esse pluralitatem animarwn, esset
numerus aniniarum tam in homine quam in illis sive ex illis. Quare juxta
numerum quinque sensum essent quinque animae in hOmine, et aliae quinquae
juxta numerum viriurn alianun, ... "
" D. A. Callus, ''The Problem of the Plurality ofFonn ..... pp. 582583. It
must be said that Callus somewhat overstates the claims he made for the
innovation of St. Thomas. John of La Rochelle was not referred to in Callus'
article, but at least in him, the problem was tackled on the basis of the unity of
being provided by a fonn, a solution not less metaphysical than the basic one
provided by Thomas.
40
72
51
Ibid" p. 585.
Buis fortior,"
56 S. C. G, II, 50, Q.D. de anima, a. 6; S. T. lao 75, 5.
51 J. de Vries, "Zum thomistischen Beweis der Immaterialitat der Geistseele,"
Scholastik 40 (1965), pp. 3 - 4.
58 S. T. lao 75, 5, ad. 4: "In substantiis intellectualibus est compositio ex actu
et potentia, non quidem ex materia et fonna, sed ex fonna et esse participato.
Unde a quibusdam dicuntur componi ex quo est et quod est. Ipsum enim esse
est quo aUquid est/'
59 See Lottin, 0, ''La composition hy16morphic des substances spirituelles.
Debut de la controverse," Revue neo-scolastique de philosophie, 34 (1932), pp.
De anima, ill, v.
S. C. G. II, 62; 68, 2; 76, 9; Q. D. de anima, a 6, obj. 1l.
.
74 CfE. Gilson, History o/Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages, pp.198205; B. Zedler's "Introduction" in St. Thomas Aquinas, On the Unity of the
Intellect Against the Averroists (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press,
1968), p. 2.
72
73
21 - 44.
Q. D. de anima, a.9, obj. 20.
the Thirteenth Century," Modern Schoolman 5 (1972), pp. 251 - 279. William
60
feared that it detracted from the inunortality of the soul. Cf. E. A. Moody, op.
61
cit., p. 60~ R.-A., Gauthier, "Note sur les debuts ... ", p. 356.
76
77
Loc. cit.
S. T., la 79, 6.
80 Averroes, Commentan'um Magnum in Anstotelfs de Anima, Libras ill, F. S.
Crawford, ed (Cambridge MA: Medieval Academy of America, 1953), conun
78
79
4, pp. 383 - 384; comm. 5, pp. 388 - 389; conun. 19, p. 441; II, conun. 32, p.
178.
SI Ibid., comm. 33, p. 476
82 S. C. G. II, c. 74; Q. D. de anima, a. II, III; S. T. 1a. 76, a. 2.
83 Aristotle, On the Generation ofAnimals, II, 3, 736b 27 - 29.
84 Aquinas Against the Averroists, op. cit., 46, p. 63 - '64: "Sed quia potentia
dicitur ad actum, necesse est ut unumquodque secundum earn rationem sit in
potentia, secundwn quam rationem convenit sibi esse actu.... aliis fonnis, que
non habent operationem absque communicatione materiae, convenit sic esse
actu ut magis ipse sint quibus compos ita sunt, et quodammodo compositis
coexistentes, quam quod earwn est in concretione ad materiam, ita totaliter
educi dicWltur de potentia. materie. Anima autem intellectiva cum habeat
operationem sine corpore, non est esse suwn solum in c~ncreti~ne ad
materiamj unde non potest dici quod educatur de materia, sed magis quod est a
principio extrinseco.'" .
74
75
99
S. T. la, 78, 3.
Ibid., la, 84, 6: ''Nihil autem corporeum imprimere potest in rem
incorpoream. "
104 Ibid., la, 12.4.
lOS Ibid., 1a, 84, 7; 85, I ad. 5: ''Dicendurn quod intellectus noster et abstrahit
species intelligibiles a phantasmatibus, in quantum considerat naturas rerum in
lUliversa1i; et tamen intelligit eas in phantasmatibus, quia non potest intelligere
etiam ea quorum species abstrahit, nisi convertendo se ad phantasmata ....
106 F. C. Copleston, op. cit., p. 183.
107 In librum Boethii de Trinitate, q. 6, 2, ad. 5: " ... phantasma est principium
nostrae cognitionis, ut ex quo incipit intellectus operatio non sicut transiens,
sed sicut pennanens ut quoddam fundarnentum intellectualis operationis; sicut
principia demonstrationis oportet manere in onmi processu scientiae, cum
phantasmata comparentur ad intellecturn ut obiecta, in quibus inspicit omne
quod inspicit vel seclUldum perfectum repraesentationem vel per negation em.
Et ideo quando phantasmatum cognitio hnpeditur, oportet totaliter impe4iri
cognitionem intellectus etiam in divinis."
108 G. F. Kreyche, ''TIle Soul-Body Problem in St. Thomas," The New
Scholasticism, 46 (1972), p 474.
102
\03
Chapter 3
ARGUMENTS FOR IMMORTALITY
"
78
That is one way his arguments for immortality can be seen. For even
though he read Aristotle as supporting the immortality of the soul, it is
clear that nowhere did the philosopher try to show that immortality can
be demonstrated by rational argument. The whole practice of arguing
for inunortality is thus decidedly a legacy of Platonic tradition.
Such influence of Platonic tradition on Aquinas appears almost
inevitable given its long duration and the enormous influence it exerted
on the literal world of the time, including the pillars of Christian,
Moslem and Jewish thinking of the age just before the thirteenth
century, and also given the fact that the influence of Aristotle had hardly
dug in deep enough to dislodge the already entrenched Platonic world
view. We have seen that the very presence of some Aristotelian
doctrines, as that of the soul as fonn, could be one of the factors
underlying the increase in the defence of inunortality in the thirteenth
century, and that the argument which thinkers of the time used was most
often discordant with their understanding of the soul, which was
basically Platonic or Augustinian. The fact that Aquinas draws very
close to Aristotle in his anthropology is an indication that despite the
influence of Platonic theories on all the thinkers, Aquinas, for one, took
seriously what he understood to be the consequence of the basic
doctrines of Aristotle on the soul. The arguments he used are not
different, and are all drawn from thinkers and sources that were
contemporary to him. The sources of the arguments are never
mentioned, and they are often given different interpretations and
different functions, but the bases of all the arguments used by Thomas
are to be found in authors who flourished shortly before him.
Aquinas argues for inunortality of the soul directly in at least six of
his works written at different periods of his intellectual evolution. But
these should be read in conjunction with other passages not written on
the rational soul, but under which the rational soul can be subsumed.
When, for instance, he argues for the inunateriality and incorruptibility
of intellectual substances, including the angels, the same arguments and
procedure are used that apply without any qualification to the human
soul. The arguments used are very diverse, even though there are basic
lines that could be traced through most of them. Such considerations as
the nature of intellectual knowledge and the operation of knowing can
be said to be basic to the whole structure of his philosophy of mind, but
it is not for that reason that they should be singled out in the context of
the arguments for immortality. The arguments Aquinas used are marked
by the state of the maturity of his thought at the moment of writing. 2 The
doctrinal points under consideration, the purpose and circumstances
79
surrounding the particular work in which the arguments are found also
influence them. These cumulative influences on the. proofs can be
divided into external and internal factors. External factors would
include the historical context in which the particular work was written
which very often touches on the slant of the arguments, and on the
specific intention or purpose of the proof. The internal factors will be
such circumstances that surround the text irrespective of the content of
the proof, the position of the argument within the text and the literary
style adopted in the text, which invariably determines the way the
arguments are pursued.
In general, Aquinas' arguments are based on his general theory about
human nature and specifically about the nature of the rational soul. Thus
the points, some of which were briefly discussed in the previous
chapter, should always be taken as the background for any reading of
the specific arguments outlined. Aquinas himself makes numerous
cross-references in the texts on inunortality to doctrines for which he
has argued in different contexts, but which come to support the
arguments for immortality. The implication of this is that the weight
which he gives to the general project of defending immortality should
not be taken as indicated by the specific words used, nor indeed by the
length and number of the arguments proffered. Usually such
considerations as number and length are more influenced by the internal
and external contexts of the text than by Aquinas' judgement about the
feasibility of the whole process of arguing for immortality. Again, his
arguments are also based on the presumption of the principles taken for
granted by the intellectual world of his time.' It is therefore not very
correct to grade any particular argument as secondary just because the
principle on which it stands requires itself to be proven.' Where he does
not refer to a principle for which he has previously argued, and does not
argue for a new principle which he cites as background, Aquinas bases
his reasoning on the conunon experience of hwnan nature. This is
indeed the strongest starting point of his arguments, and except for a
few of them which are grounded on logical deduction from generally
accepted principles, the rest are all ultimately based on appeals to the
conunon structure and certitude of hwnan conscious experience. s His
method is to call those who are endowed with human consciousness to
look inwards, and by so doing to encounter their rationality, their
spirituality and their inunortality. Such introspection used in defence of
immortality cannot therefore be the exclusive preserve of highly
developed intellects that can in any age be few in number. 6 It is obvious
that what he appeals to is the common nature of humankind. Problems
80
can of course be raised about those who are not able for one reason or
another to reach this general development, but that is not to say that
only some realize the experience on which he based his arguments for
immortality.
Like most of his immediate predecessors, Aquinas believed that
through such appeals combined with deduction from commonly
acceptable principles and practices, even the. unbelievers can be brought
to accept the fact of immortality. Not that all the texts are written for
unbelievers, it is rather a realization that the challenge to immortality is
in fact not found among belief except in the modified sense of
specifying the type of immortality to which a particular explanation of
the nattue of the soul leads. With regard to the latter, the texts written
alier the conflict of Averroism will be found in the context of the
obvious attempt to specify what sort of immortality is implied. Apart
from these, the generality of the arguments are presented in such a way
as to leave no doubt that he intends to counter his opponent on
philosophical grounds. There is nevertheless no reticence to cite the
81
We have seen that there was no common practice on this matter among
his contemporaries and that in fact only a few like John Blund and
Philip the Chancellor distinguished the two concepts. 8 Most identified
the two and we have in Aquinas enough indication that he also makes
no fundamental distinction between them. In passages where he argues
either for immateriaiity and for incorruptibility separately, it is first seen
that the points he calls to witness are also those he use for immortality,
and in other places, it is only with regard to spiritual substances that
incorruptibility is argued for, arguments which, as we have said, would
apply to the rational soul and to its immortality without any
modification.
Aquinas does not follow the practice of some of his predecessors in
ordering the arguments according to their power of conviction. In John
of La Rochelle one finds for the first time the grouping ofthe arguments
into what he calls ratione commune and ratione proprie, even _though
John does not indicate what lies behind the distinction, and which of the
groupings should be given pride of place in the attempt to prove
immortality. Odo Rigaldus groups his own arguments into those from
authority and those from reason. It was Albert the Great who makes the
most balanced weighing of the arguments for immortality, making a
fourfold categorization of the arguments.' We have also seen that there
is no effort by Albert to show the reasons behind his groupings,
especially the distinction between probable and necessary arguments.
However, latent in this practice is the acceptance that not all the
arguments used to prove immortality are of equal convincing power,
thus implicitly leaving room for critical questioning of even those he
82
83
some over and above the others. McCormick groups the issue of
immortality and that of the state of the separated soul in Aquinas among
questions that "are asked seriously because the questioner does not
know the answer." Using this as a principle, he asserts that "St. Thomas
84
Arguments/or Immortality
...people for Aquinas, are rational, lUlderstanding animals, and they are
what they are by virtue of what is not material. This aspect of people
must. he concludes, be capable of surviving the destruction of what is
material. He does not think we can prove that the soul of Fred must
survive Fred's death. In his view, whether or not Fred's soul survives
the death of Fred will depend on whether God wills to keep it in being.
and Aquinas does not think that we are in a position to prove that God
must do that. For him, therefore, there is no 'proof of the immortality of
the soul.' He holds that Fred's soul could, in principle, cease to exist at
any time. But he does not think that it is the sort of thing of which it
makes sense to say that it can perish as bodies can perish. 17
85
body."
The view that Thomas does not intend to prove innnortality may be
one of the results of his failure to grade the argnments, and to indicate
which are considered necessary, as Albert has done. However, this
should not be overemphasized. Even though there is much to be said
about the view that Thomas intended the convincing power of his proofs
to come through the cumulative influence of all the arguments, we can
decipher in the outline of the argnments for immortality, that he makes
selections from the store of proofs available, and that from one of his
writings to the other he changes the method used and drops some of the
argnments used previously. There is certainly more in this procedure
than meets the eyes. It shows in fact that he does not consider all the
86
Arguments/or Immortality
87
88
89
produce one and only one being. A problem arises from the destiny of
this single being that is the result of the composition. If there is one
being, and corruption is understood as the change from being to nonbeing, one part of the composite cannot be corrupted without the other,
because the one being that has emerged is owed to the union of the two.
Ifthe soul is the form of the body, the corruption of the composite must
entail that of the soul. The fourth difficulty is an anticipation of a
possible answer to this objection." It could be said that the soul is form
and substance at the same time, and if the soul ceases to exist inasmuch
as it is a form, it does not do so in so far as it is a substance. However
such a soul can either be form essentially or by virtue of one of its
accidents. If it is essentially a form, and no one thing Can have a
plurality of essences, it follows that if the soul does not survive
inasmuch as it is a form, then its only essence is indeed corruptible. If,
on the other hand, it is supposed that the soul is form by one of its
accidents, then, given that it is the substantial union of soul and body
that makes a man, man will be being by accident, which, to all intents
and purposes is an absurd conclusion.
The basis of the response to the above problems is that the soul is a
different form from other material forms, and has being absolutely. As
to the disappearance of the being of the soul with that of the being of the
composite, the soul does not owe its being to the composite. Aquinas
refers to its operations which show its independence of the composiie,
while other forms, which perish with the death of the composite, have
no operation that is not mediated by matter. Here, one of the difficulties
of immortality is only broached: if human soul is immortal, why does
the soul of aoimals which is also immaterial die? It will be treated more
extensively in other works on immortality, but the unity of being which,
on theoretical grounds, and without reference to activities, seems to
support the mortality of the aoimal soul is raised against immortality.
The answer to the fourth difficulty is that the soul is not only a
substance, but also hoc aliquid, designations that apply only to the soul:
among all other forms. It is on this ground that two considerations are
relevant to it: first as a substance and then as a form. As a form it should
not be taken that the many qualities it possesses are divergent, and
independent, such that one thing is its essence and another its being as
form, as a colour would be in a body. It is not as form that the soul
survives the body, but because of its possession of absolute being and
being subsistent. Aquinas gives an example to explain his response: man
has understanding not because he is an aoimal, but because he is
90
rational, even though both rationality and animality are essential to his
being."
Thomas does not say here that the essence of the soul as form is
destroyed by the destruction of the body, nor does he also answer the
issue raised by the difficulty with regard to whether the soul, if
essentially fonn, loses its nature as fonn or continues to be fonn, even if
separated from the body. However, it is clear from several other
sections of his work that he still maintains that the soul remains a form
after separation, even though it does not vivify a body any more." Such
a position will be very useful later when he comes to reflect on the
resurrection. The '\Ilalogy with man being rational and animal at the
same time does not seem to be a suitable answer. What is at stake is
whether the soul, understood as essentially form, continues to exist if
this essence ceases to exist, since one being cannot have two essences at
the same time. A proper application of the analogy to the issue would be
to consider the status of man ifhe loses any of those properties, i.e., can
a human being remain human if he is no longer rational? The proper
answer to the objection is linked to the status of the soul after separation
and also to what is considered to be its natural endowment for future
resurrection, and these are points which are properly suited for the soul
Arguments/or Immortality
91
phantasm does not indicate any essential dependence on the body, given
that it has some operatim;s which flow from it in an absolute manner. As
to the question of a being not existing without its operation, Aquinas
answers that the soul will have another mode of understanding at
death."
The two remaining objections are linked with the question of the
origin of the soul. It is impossible that a being lasts forever if it did not
exist forever because that power which enables it not to cease to exist is
the same that makes it possible for it never to have ceased to exist. If
therefore the soul begins to exist with the body, it means that it has not
existed always and will also not last forever. The seventh objection
mentions the doctrine of creation explicitly. All that is from nothing can
also revert to nothing, and if the soul is created from nothing, it cannot
be incorruptible. That the soul did not start to exist from infinity is due
to the fact that its being is not from itself. If indeed the being of the soul
were from the soul, it would have beeri infinite in the sense outlined in
the objection. Thus for Aquinas, what the argument proves is no more
than that what has the power always to be, as long as it retains this
power cannot cease to exist. As regards the soul's reverting to non-being
whence it comes, he answers that it does not also prove more than that
the soul depends for its being on the principle from which it receives
this being in the first place, and in the absence of this inflow of being
from their origin, all beings will revert to non-being. It has already been
noted that this idea of the dependence of finite beings on their Creator is
found in most of the thinkers of the thirteenth century, and that it is not
a reason to suppose that Aquinas does not intend to prove immortality
from rational argumentation. In fact the raising of ser'lous objections and
the answers he tries to give to them, even though in ~ccordance with the
style of the time, can be an indication that the arguments outlined are
intended to demonstrate the immortality of the soul. The objections are
like the clearing of the ground, but we notice also that in them, he
makes references to many convictions in the name of which he argues
for immortality on rational grounds. Among these are especially his idea
about the nature of the soul and its activity in understanding. The rest of
what he wrote on immortality are contained in the rebuttals he used
prior to the solution which is usually intended to present the final
answers to the problem at issue but which in this case does not serve
that purpose. Like in what we have so far seen, Aquinas remains
tentative and haphazard in his presentation of the arguments.
It is in fact within the context of the rebuttal that he attempts to
present few of the clear independent arguments for immortality. Of the
92
93
" i
94
95
96
function of the agent intenect. It is thus through the mediation of its own
acts that the intellect knows itself.
None is left in doubt that, like Aristotle, Aquinas insists on the
material, sensory origin of all human knowledge. We cannot have a
direct knowledge of pure essence, even if it is the essence of our own
intellect. It is by the actualization of the cognitive ability of the intellect
that we come to know, as it were, by a sort of inference from the very
act of the intellect. Thus we cannot know whether we can argue or
judge, unless we in fact enga~e in these acts. It means that our selfknowledge cannot be direct. 4 The manifestation of intellectual acts
involves the reference of these act to and use of objects of knowledge
which are all originally sensible. It is therefore correct to say that the
first thing that the intellect knows is a particular object, then it comes to
know the activity by which the object is known. Through this activity
the intenect knows itself through thinking, which is its proper
function. 46
There is the possibility of infinite regress in such a recurring process
of knowing through activity, and knowing that one knows through
knowing and so on," but the more serious problem is the status of such
knowledge because the proof of inunortality is based on it. Given that
the proper object of the intenect is the universal, is the intellect's selfknowledge universal or particular? Philip has rightly pointed out that
Socrates' knowledge of himself cannot be the same as the universal
knowledge of humanity. If this knowledge is to be of the individual self,
it is necessary that it is not altogether devoid of phantasm, otherwise
there is the problem of making it a particular knowledge of the intellect.
For Philip the Chancellor, such knowledge must be of the individual as
separate and immortal substance, but the question of what role
phantasms play is not addressed It could be argued that what is meant
by self-knowledge can be reduced to a certain type of awareness or
introspection of the act of knowing. But this does not seem to be enough
in this context for the effect that self-intellection is intended to achieve.
Again the analogy Aquinas makes with faculties using material organs
does not indicate that he does not mean real, direct knowledge of the
intellect of itself. It is indeed because he presents the intellect as in
some way focusing on itself that the example of physical organs makes
sense. It seems then that the type of particular knowledge the intellect
has of itself will require the presence of individuating phantasms, since
the soul does not know its essence, and its self-knowledge cannot be
universal knowledge of man. It is possible also to say that the essence of
the soul is spiritual, and inunaterial, and thus its direct knowledge is in
Arguments/or Immortality
97
98
99
beings, they cannot lose their form or their essence, and hence are
incorruptible."
Another proof of incorruptibility is an adaptation of one of
Avicenna's proofs ofinunortality in his De anima." It is founded on the
absence of matter in intellectual substance. Anything which is
corruptible has a potentiality to non-being. The intellectual substance
has no potentiality to non-being, for in it the complete substance is the
recipient of being. That means that it is wholly being. Aquinas then
states that the proper recipient of any act is related to the act in the form
100
101
102
103
104
real substances in nature, which can remain forever on their own. This
view is the unexpressed presupposition in all instances in which
Aquinas uses the presence of universal in the mind to argue for
immortality. He says that the maker is superior to the made, given that
the intelligible in act is incorruptible and the agent intellect actualizes
such intelligibles, all the more : _.orruptible will the agent intellect be.
Being immortal and part of the soul, the soul must also be inunortal."
Very unusually, Aquinas deals with possible objections to the
arguments for inunortality after he bas presented his arguments, a
procedure that is found only in the Contra gentiles. He uses the
opportunity to raise certain important points and to present some
clarification in respect of the question of inunortality. One of such is
again the question of what type of activity a soul, which has lost its
body, can perfonn. Here he delves into a long explanation ofthe state of
the rational soul after separation, which is essentially the same as what
he has already said in the II Sententtarum, and which we shall discuss
more fully in the next chapter. There are other objection with obvious
answers: the one based on the eternity of the world, a doctrine which is
not acceptable to Aquinas, and another which supposes that if the soul is
indeed able to live without the body, it would mean that its union with
the body is accidental to it, and thus man is human only by accident.
Two related objections from the principle of individuation merit our
consideration here. First if the numerality of souls accords with that of
105
the body, then if it is supposed that bodies are separated from souls at
death, either all the souls die or only one of them remains. The reason
for this objection is that if multiplicity and individuation is in fact due to
matter, then the absence of this principle of multiplicity will entail that
human souls will merge into one being, since' they have one essence.
Credence would then be given either to Alexander of Aphrodisias (who
says that a single agent intellect survives the body) or to the disciples of
Averroes. for whom what survives the body is the unitary possible
intellect. The answer that Aquinas gives to this possible difficulty is that
the soul is not dependent for its being on the body, and so, even though
the soul is multiple in accordance with the multiplicity of the body, it is
not the body that is the cause of this multiplicity. The principle in which
he anchors this response is that things that must be proportioned and
adapted to one another must derive their multiplicity or unity each from
its own cause. If it is supposed that one of these is dependent on another
for its being, then its multiplicity or otherwise must also depend on the
thing that is its cause. If not, it must depend on something else. This
does not however obviate the matching of matter to fonn, for, according
to Aqninas, the proper act (fonn) is produced for its proper matter, and
therefore matter and fonn have to accord with one another with regard
to multiplicity and unity. It follows that if the being of the fonn is bound
up with matter, its multiplicity or unity will also depend completely on
matter. If however a fonn is independent of matter, even though it has
to be multiplied or united in accordance with its matter, it is not on
matter that this unity or multiplicity is based. Aquinas is here calling for
a mental conception in which the soul is viewed as existing apart from
the matter, full in its life, but has the necessity of being proportioned
and adapted to matter. Because such a soul has prior existence, nothing
essential to it is due to its matter. Still because it must be in proportion
to matter, to a particular matter that is its body, it must be multiplied to
realize this fundamental aspect of its nature." It means in effect that
multiplicity in the soul is due to the substance of the soul, not to its
union with the body. All problems are not thereby satisfactorily
resolved, as another objection shows.
The objector insists that to the fonnal principle is owed the diversity
of species." If, however, it is supposed that souls remain multiple after
separation from the body, they must be divergent one from the other. In
souls that are separated, the only possible cause of diversity is the fonn,
given that in the soul, there is no composition of matter and fonn. For
souls to be diverse without matter of any kind means in effect that they
belong to different species after separation from the body. This
106
107
hal
108
109
where they are thought by the intellect. If indeed there is a proviso that
the intellect is unable to receive or know anything sensible, then it could
be said to have the nature of that particular thing, which must be
material, since all sensible forms have their origin in sensible matter.
Aquinas draws this point from the common experience of man, drawing
an analogy from the senses, which he applies to the soul.
Aquinas' use of the argument is more consistent than many other
thinkers of his epoch who used it before him, even though in it he still
upholds an epistemology mainly inspired by Plato. Some commentators
have not been less critical because of his obvious consistency. We have
already seen the points made by M. Kelly, especially the contention that
holding on to the logic of the argument, it is also possible to prove that
the soul is not a being, since it apprehends all beings in knowledge."
Compelling as the argument of Kelly may appear, it seems not to have
taken adequate account of the epistemology, which is the foundation of
Aquinas' argument. It can be argued on the side of Aquinas that man
does not in fact have direct and unmediated knowledge of being as such.
Given that all that man knows about the immaterial, including God, is
derived from analogy from the material, from the sensible, it is at least
not certain that Aquinas would in fact hold that the type of knowledge
he is referring to also includes the mediate knowledge of non-material
things, which is by analogy. If this contention is anything to go by, it
would follow that the type of knowledge man has of being, mediated by
his knowledge of the sensible forms, must also be subject to the same
conditions, at least at their origin.
The critique of Kelly was axed on the text where Aquinas employed
the same argument for his explanation of the subsistence of the soul. It
is in fact on the same text in the Summa thea/agioe that another
commentator, A. Kenny, rests his critique. First, Kenny rightly says that
the argument is not for subsistence, but that it proves that the soul is not
a body which, in the Summa thea/agioe, was first tackled prior to the
110
111
taste ~ a very pleasant one, as fanciers of ox tongue will agree. lI77 How
One of such contexts where he did not refer to the specific mode of
inunortality is the text on incorruptibility in the Summa theoiogiae, but
here also he shows that the question is not unimportant by other
passages where he dwells on it, just as in the Contra gentiles. In fact, it
must be borne constantly in mind that the type of immortality Aquinas is
defending is the one that will give enough room for individual moral
or confinnation.
The one proof in question is the same that has been repeated in other
works: that the soul is not corrupted neither per se nor per accidens.
However, here Aquinas shows more sophistication than hitherto in his
elaboration of this thesis. He begins by asserting that it is impossible for
a subsistent thing to cease to be by accident, because something comes
into being or reverts to non-being in accordance with the mode of
existence that is proper to its nature, that is, in consonance with the way
112
113
it had being or the way in which it was devoid of being. This means that
if something had being by itself, it can only lose that being through a
then it can lose its being indirectly when something else in which it
inheres as an accident loses its being. The souls of animals die in this
way with the death of the body because their being is dependent on the
being of the composite. However, rational souls can only cease to exist
through internal causes. But, given that the soul is subsistent form, it is
not possible that it passes away on its own. This is shown by a brief
analysis of the way in which things lose their being. Fonn is the
actuality of a thing, and hence the matter of a thing has existence ouly
when it acquires a form. When it ceases to be, it is because it has lost its
fonn. It means then that something, which, like the human soul, is itself,
time, it cannot but desire being in that mrumer. The desire for being is
erroneous. One such inclination or natural tendency is the desire for real
and complete happiness, together with the inclination to avoid
unhappiness. From common human experience this desire caunot be
satisfied by something material, because the soul is spiritual and nothing
inferior to it can give it everlasling satisfaction. If lower creatures have
natural means of satisfying their own inclinations, then such a higher
being as the human soul must not lack its own satisfaction. But what
constitutes the satisfaction of the human soul must not only be
incorporeal, it must also be everlasting, and thus immune from death,
since anything associated with death smacks of unhappiness. 86 If then
the human soul longs for endless beatitude, it must be immortal, since
nothing mortal can be the subject of perennial happiness." William of
Auvergne also uses the desire for happiness, but again, gives it his own
114
slant. According to him, the worst evil in the natural order is death or
destruction, and its opposite is complete happiness. The soul constantly
tries to avoid this evil, and this is an indication that it must be contrary
to its nature. That this is so is supported by the fact that the movement
of the soul is always towards higher things, which indicates where its
end lies. That type of happiness to which the soul tends is perpetual or
endless happiness, and if such a desire is innate in the soul, it must be an
attainable end, and an end, which is contrary to death, given that all
88
natural motions are unidirectional.
From the above insttmces of the application of the principle of
natural desire not being in vain, we can already see the distinctive
characteristic of Aquinas' use of the principle. First of all, Aquinss
obliquely designates it a sign of immortality. This is reminiscent of
Albert the Great's grouping of some proofs of immortality as only signs
while others are considered as probable and necessary proofs. It has, of
course, been said that Aquinas did not follow that aspect of Albert's
style, stiII it can be said that he is not altogether uninfluenced by that
aspect of his master's innovation. Again, it would seem that by the time
he wrote the Summa rhe%giae, the angelic doctor had started being
selective with the argoments. The question would appear to have arisen
which argoments to use, and which can serve merely as support for or
elucidation of major and more fundamental ones. He does not anywhere
express unequivocally his preferences among the argoments, but we can
see that some are dropped, others are reshaped and others restated
repeatedly, and the reason for this does not appear to be accidental or
without any design.
Another characteristic of Thomas' presentation of the argoment from
desire is that he links it to the phenomenon of intellectual knowledge.
"Each time Aquinas presents his proof from desire, writes St. Hilaire,
II
"he makes sure that he includes the intellect's part in the tendency.""
This is indeed a special insight brought to the old argoment from desire,
although it is founded on the well-known cooperation between knowing
and willing. In rational beings, the intellect has the function of
apprehension, and where it is not in a position to do this immediately, of
research and judgement after reasoning. The tendency of the will has to
be enlightened by the light of the intellect in order to see an obj ect as
good to be desired or evil to be avoided, depending on the context and
the airo at stake. Thus, bringing in the role of the intellect, Aquinas is
intent on highlighting that it is not just blind desire that is propelling the
soul, but a cognition, an awareness of the object of desire, which in the
present context he designates as timeless being.
115
Scholars ofSt. Thomas who tried to give this proof from desire some
pride of place among other proofs used by st. Thomas have rightly not
failed to notice that it is not mere desire that is at stake in the proof, but
the general hwnan quest for being, and not just for being, but for total
being. Our view is that taking Aquinas' proofs for immortality as an
ensemble, there is no reason for highlighting that proof over and above
others. J. - Y. Jollif seems to support this view when he says that one
needs only little reflection to become convinced that there is no good
reason to accord special consideration to the desire for immortality, and
to make it the foundation of a proof. Again he says that there are many
other desires as fundamental to man as the desire for immortality, but
which no one argnes must be realizable.
The different presentations of the argoment from desire show in fact
that what one desire does not necessarily need to be immortality. While
some say that the desire for justice is natural, others concentrate on the
desire for happiness. Thomas upholds the desire for everlasting being as
fundamental. All these lead the thinkers to the affirmation of
irrunortality, but if one insists that such desires must not be in vain, it is
difficult to find reason why only those desires the authors highlight must
be fulfilled. It is on this consideration that Jollif asserts that the desire
for immortality would not be of any philosophical value, if it is not
understood as founded on a more fundamental ontological structure. of
the spirit of man." It is thus not the desire for empirical existence which
will last forever, but a desire directed to being as such, emanating from
a spirit which in itself has the power of questioning being as such. Such
a desire, named psychological desire therefore refers to a more
primordial desire inscribed deep in the being of man.
We have noted that when Jollif reserves such a desire for the
philosophers alone, while supposing that non-philosophers live such
desire daily without being conscious of it, he seems to go too far in his
interpretation of the argoment. In fact he seems to undermine the
intention of Thomas, for the angelic doctor laid the convincing power of
his proof on the doorsteps of the common experience of mankind. Such
an interpretation as Jollifs will further raise the ante, demanding a
116
117
118
119
120
tipped for omission while other weaker ones are enumerated in the
course of his work. The raising of this objection may be a pointer to the
fact that somehow the fact of an order of being is in itself not enough to
argue for similarity, for one can reasonably ask why apes do not share
the higher characteristics of human beings. But again, in st. Albert, for
example, man is taken as the link between the material and the spiritual
order. He would not occupy this position if he were completely
corruptible. Even then, Albert groups the arguments from the order of
being among the probable arguments.
The next objection that attracts our interest is a rare one. Aquinas has
hitherto argued from the point of view of an ideal human soul, endowed
with the normal capacity to understand, to judge and to reflect on its
own activities. The objector questions that assumption. If a property
belongs to a given species, it is fitting that all or at least most of the
members of that species will possess that ability. In the case of humans
however, experience indicates that only very few people are intelligent,
for which reason to understand carmot be the proper characteristic of the
98
human soul. This objection presupposes the assertion of the previous
one - that inunortality or incorruptibility can only be known from the
intellectual activity of man. The answer Thomas proffers is that even
though only very few people arrive at perfect understanding, all people
achieve some level of understanding, and this is shown by the presence
of the first principles in all human intellects.
The answer given to the objection seems to overlook the slide from
understanding as being the characteristic property of human nature as
such and to the phenomenon of intelligence. It is correct to say that in
the actual world, only very few people are intelligent, intelligence
understood as special endowment or capacity for quick and deep
understanding. However, being intelligent is a concept that can allow
much fluidity. When specifically is intelligence to be attributed to a
human being, and at what point can we say correctly that someone is not
intelligent? A lot of relative factors must come into play for such a fine.
line to be drswn. What is clear however is that the usual, conventional
employment of the word intelligence is not synonymous with
121
understanding. The answer that Thomas gives takes the two meanings
on board. The few he takes as being able to attain perfect understanding
(pauci perveniant ad perfecte intelligendum) are in fact those that
would be described as intelligent, while the normal common ability to
understand, he attributes to the generality of mankind, by their ability to
perceive the first principles of demonstration. The question that arises
from this answer is whether in fact the point for inunortality is vitiated if
there are some human beings unable even to attain the knowledge of
first principles, either because of deformity or age. It seems that it
would be enough to show that such an act as understanding is a general
122
Argumentsfor Immortality
123
past, and can project into the future, a capacity we are not quite sur~
exists in animals in any elaborate sense. But how can we come to"
explain our knowledge of being as such, in such a timeless m3IU1er from
the background of Aquinas' epistemology? Our knowledge of being is
not direct. It is only through their activities that we come to know being,
fIrst through the senses, and the extension of our knowledge is the
elaboration or refIuing of the original knowledge derived from the
senses. Even our knowledge of God must depart from the knowledge we .
have of material things, for the human intellect cannot have any direct
apprehension of the infinity that is God. That is in fact why man's
knowledge of God is never free from anthropomorphism. The same
epistemic principle applies to the rational soul, which, according to
Aquinas, is known only through its acts. What St. Thomas calls the
absolute knowledge of being cannot but come through a certain via
negativa. By imagining the absence of the limitation of the here and
now, of the empirical with which our knowledge is in fact always
bound, we can consciously exclude these limitations from timeless
being. However, given the inherent human limitation, it is difficult to
see how this knowledge can be seen as apprehension of timeless being.
The un.iversal concepts have a similar origin in Aquinas. They arise
from the abstraction of the common features of the species from the
particular individual features. But their existence is mediated by sense
impression, and going through all the process of the formation of
images, abstraction by the agent intellect, and the reception of the
common characteristics by the possible intellect forming a general idea
of what is perceived. With this background, Aquinas' position on the
pristine problem of universals is that contrary to the followers of Plato,
universals are not independent existents. They actnally exist, fIrst in
material things, as esse naturale, and later in the mind, intentionally or
as esse intentionale,103 and through them, the intellect acquires the
formal elements of different species of being. This really is the decisive
difference between sense and intellectual knOWledge, and between
human and animal knowledge. Going from this, Aquinas infers that the
intellect that is the repository of such universals or general concepts
cannot operate through material otgans, because, being incOiruptible,
the intellect, which is their repository or which knows things through
them, must also be immortal.
The use of similar conception of human knowledge has been the
most recurrent starting point from which the simplicity and the
immortality of the soul were proved. Its beghming goes back as far as
Plato's Fhaedo. In the Christian era, Augustine made the possession of
124
knowledge the focal point of his argument for immortality. His only
argument for immortality in the Soliloquia is that truth is eternal, that
even if the whole material universe were to perish, truth as such must
remain. Science (disciplina) is true in virtue of the truth itself, and is
even identifiable with truth (esl aulem disciplina verilas). If science
exists in the soul, the soul itself must be immortal, since it is the
receptacle of science, which is imperishable. 104 The same argument is
taken up in the De immortalitate, with some elaboration, and here he
plunges into infinite regress by his assertion that science must exist
somewhere. Many authors subsequently make use of the same idea, but
with the exception of Philip the Chancellor, lOS the rest modify
Augustine's line of reasoning to suit their own style and purpose.
Auvergne talks of the idea of infinity in the soul, and gives the example
of geometry, in which many truths have been discovered, and which still
remains open to many more discoveries. That the soul is so open to this
infinite knowledge shows, for William, that it must have infmite
capacity by nature. 106 Dominic Gundissalinus and John of La Rochelle
among others employ the infmite capacity of the soul to unllerstand as
an indication of its nature, sometimes referring to the fact that the
infinite idea of God can be in the soul, which points to its ability to go
on endlessly in existence. What distinguishes all these from Thomas
Aquinas is not just the variation in the use of knowledge in the soul, but
also the fact that none of the authors prior to him defends an
epistemology that is so close to Aristotle's as Thomas does. Most of
them presuppose the hypostatization of intellectual knowledge, but it
seems that such practice accords more with Neoplatonic epistemology
to which these authors, with the exception of Thomas, more or less
ascribe.
What Aquinas makes of the presence of universals in the mind raises
the question of how the mental presence of these universals is to be
explained. Universals of course exist in the mind, but it does not appear
that they exist in such a way that we can lay hold of independent
substantive entities called universals. 107 The existence of the universals
cannot be well understood independently of the existence of the intellect
itself. It seems then that their presence in the intellect is more like the
modification of the intellect; that their existence is more akin to the
existence of accidents than of substance. To hold otherwise would be to
substitute universals for Plato's ideas, even though the universals would
now have the intellect as their world instead of extraterrestrial world
that Plato postulated. What this would entail is that universals, taken in
this sense, may not be the type of thing one can attribute immortality or
125
incorruptibility to. If, in fact, its mode of existence is more akin to the
accidental than to the substantial, it would mean that whether it is
incorruptible or not depends on whether the intellect itself is
incorruptible, but the incorruptibility of the intellect or the soul is
exactly what the nature of universals is called to be a witness to. If this
were so, then it would appear to be a case of begging the question ..
Another difficulty is the nature of the universals themselves. They
are usually understood as general concepts abstracted from the
particular conditions of here and now. That makes the universal or
concept applicable to several individual instances, because the formal
nature of these particulars is what is contained in the universal. IOB
However, the universal in the intellect is not altogether cut off from the
sense, or from images. It seems that no matter how our concepts are, for
us to be conscious of them requires some form of particularization, or
some fleshing out. One who has the concept or the universal house
knows what a house is wherever he sees it, but he can in no way think of
a house without having some walls, roofed and with doors. Because of
the universal state of his knowledge, any colour can be substituted for
the colour or the door, or it may even be colourless doors, but it seems
an unattainable feat to think of a house without some iIlljlges, without
some particularization. Kenny says as much when he gives the example
of a universal idea with a logical prlnciple or proposition, or with such a
statement as "Every road leads to some place." This is no doubt a
general idea. Yet he asserts that "there must be some exercise of sense
or hnagination, some application of concepts or the application of the
knowledge of necessary truths."For a man to apply the concept red, he
must either discriminate this concept from other concepts of coloW', or
have an hnage of red in his intellect. He can also have a ''mental echo of
the word red, or be reading or writing about redness." Even when the
passive knowledge of such concepts is presupposed, "it seems that
without some vehicle of sensory activity, there could be no exercise of
the concept.." For all intents and purposes, knowledge of general truth
operates in the same way. There is apparently no way they can be
actualized, so to say, without being cormected to image, symbol, or
action etc. 109 What it means then is that universals in act are always
accompanied by some hnage, symbol, action, which is not all too
general. Now, given that it is through acts that we come to the
knowledge of being, i.e., that the humans beings have no direct
knowledge of being, the general concepts we are able to know are those
that are applied. While not negating the general applicability that is
characteristic of universals one can ask from where comes our
126
127
reflection. 112
The hitch with this solution is that it pushes aside the instances
where Aquinas leaves no doubt that he is speaking of the object of
knowledge, and not the act of knowledge. In some places he makes
statements that seem to concentrate more on act than on the very being
of the object of knowledge. In the II Sent, he asserts that to understand
has to do with the universal (intelligere est universalium)'IJ, and in the
Summa contra gentiles,' 14 he states that it pertains to the act of
understanding to apprehend objects, universal and incorruptible. Even
in these instances, it is because of the nature of the object of the act that
the subject from which the act emanates is said to be incorruptible. In
the end, however, de Vries seems to turn the argument round to that of
self-knowledge, which has its owo difficulties.
6.
Some of the points raised with regard to the whole issue of the
incorruptibility of intellectual knowledge are relevant to the only
argument used in the Compendium thea/agiae. The treatise is a
presentation in summary of the whole of the Catholic faith, with the
exception of the sacraments. It contains 246 short chapters. Reminiscent
of the Summa contra gentiles, it spins the doctrine on the rational soul
from the consideration of spiritual substances in general, thence to the
necessity <if the possible intellect receiving intelligible forms from
sensible things. Reading between the lines, this necessity establishes the
natural connection of a spiritual creation (the rational soul) with the
body. There is then a chapter on the necessity of positing the agent
intellect, followed by another on the incorruptibility of the human soul
(chapter 84). All these themes, together with the chapter on the unicity
of the intellect in man which comes immediately after summarize the
cardinal doctrine of. Thomas on the rational soul.
The choice of argument is remarkable in a work that is written in
summary form. There is thus no place for the cumulative method
applied in such works as Summa contra gentiles and the Q.D. de anima.
That Aquinas chose the argument from the absence of contraries can be
an indication of how much he values the argument. The same proof is
used in many other works including the Summa thea/agiae, Q. D. de
anima, and the Summa contra gentiles, and indirectly in all the passages
where he argued against Ibn Gabirol's theory of universal
hylemorphism. Like all the rest of the proofs which Aquinas employs, it
128
129
However, the next argument seems to lend this much-needed support for
the absence of contraries. Aqufuas presents it in the Summa
thea/agiae ll ' by saying that even if the soul were to be composed of
matter and form, it will still not be said to be corruptible because ofits
mode of nnderstanding. That means that even if one accepts some
nnderstanding of the matter-form composition in the soul, to read back
from its activity to its nature will still impose the conclusion that the
soul does not contain the type of contraries which will lead to
destruction, because things that are contraries in themselves are not
received as such in the soul. There is a mtity in the act of nndersttmding,
which enables the intellect to apprehend contraries without their
opposing each other. Given that the opposition of contraries in external
nature is due to the potency of matter, the conclusion one must draw is
that the soul is immaterial and is'indestructible. Thomas affirms the
existence of contraries in the soul, but for him their mode of existence
(Le., in actuality) is a strong indicator of the nature of the soul itself.
F. D. Witheimsen tries to expatiate on the implication of Aquinas'
reasoning on the mode of existence of contraries in the soul. In his
opinion, there is no alternative in real life because each being exists
according to the principle of identity. However, the indubitable human
ability to consider alternative courses of action points to a phenomenon
transcending the limitations of the material order. It is only in the human
mind and never in sensible existence that one can contemplate an
"either-or" situation.12O Still for him such situations are real. That
Aquinas reintroduces the mode of existence of contraries after arguing
that the soul is free of any matter from which contraries can arise is a
transition from the metaphysical to the epistemological order, aimed at
coming back again to confirm the earlier conclusion. For Withehnsen,
there is an important significance in this move. Aquinas points to the
fact that we consttmtly work with contraries, but this is the work of
nnderstanding as distinguished from sensation. That man entertains an
either-or situation alludes to the fact that such is the most intimate
nature of his reasoning, and without such ability, he will be not more
than an automaton. Thus, even though there are in material existence no
active contraries, this is the nonnal situation in the intellect, endowed,
as it is, with the ability to ask questions and to "balance alternative
answers." To be able to do this indicates the existence and the exercise
of a special kind of being: "spiritual being, totally absent from the
material world wherein the possibility of contraries is rooted in matter
but where actuality always precludes both being in act.,,121
130
"
131
Materialisten notwendig als Petitio principii erscheinen; er ist offenbar nur als
argwnentum ad hominem denen gegenUber gedacht, die die Unkorperlichkeit der
Seele zugeben."
5 J. de Vries. "Zwn thomistischen Beweis ... ," pp. 4 - 5.
6 J.-Y. Jollif, "Affinnation rationelle de l'immortalite de l'fune chez St. Thomas,"
Lumiere et vie 4 (1955), p. 75: Jollifs view is that the desire for unending existing
which he reads as desire for being is only realized explicitly by philosophers ..... ce
rapport l'etre qui constitue la nature meme de l'honune, et que Ie non-philosophe
vit quotidienement sans en prendre conscience. Le philosophe qui retrouve en lui
cette puissance toujours donnee de connaissance ontologique atteint -de meme
mouvement la certitude d' exister <toujours>.....
7 S.C.G. II, 79, n.15
8 Cf. Ch 1, sec. 4.
9 Cf. Albert the Great, Summa de creaturis. q. 59.
10 J.- Y. Jollif, p. 66.
II Ibid., p. 73: "II suffit de refl6chir quelques instants pour se persuader qu'il n'y a
aucune raison valable de privilegier Ie desir de l'immortalite et d'en faire Ie
fondement d'une preuve. L'argument psychologique ne prouve rigoreusement rien
s'il n'est que psychologique, et ron aura beau jeu montrer que l'homme eprouve
mille desirs apparement aussi fondes que Ie souhait de l'immortalite et..dont on ne
saurait dire cependant quoits se reaiiseront necessairement."
12 George 8t. Hilaire, "Does 8t. Thomas Really Prove the Soul's Inunortality?", The
New Scholasticism 34 ( 1960), p. 352.
Ibid., p. 345.
Ibid., pp. 352 - 353
" J. F. McConnick, "Questiones disputandae," The New Scholasticism, 13 (1939),
pp. 368 -369.
16 G. St. Hilaire, p. 341.
17 B. Davies, The Thought of Thomas Aquinas (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1992), p. 216.
18
Alexander Nequam, Speculum speculationum, m. Ixxxvii. 5: "Anima enim
13
14
NOTES
1. Owens, "The Soul as Agent." The New Scholasticism 48 (1974), p. 40
Cf. E. Bertola, "II problema deU'immortalita dell anima umana nelle opere dei
Tommaso d' Aquino," Rivista difilosofia neoscolastica 65 (1973), p. 250
3 1. Lemaire, "Les preuves de l'immortalite...." p. 35.
4 1. de Vries made the distinction between arguments that are secondary and
primary based on this criterion. See his article "Zum thomistischen Beweis der
hrunaterialiUl.t der Geistseele," Scholastik 40 (1965), p. 4: "Von all diesen Beweisen
sind aber einige offenbar sekundarer Natur, insofem ihr Ausganspunkt selbst wieder
des Beweises bedUrftig ist. So die Beweise, die davon ausgehen, daB die Seele Fonn
des Leibes ist. Das gleiche gilt von dem Beweis, der davon ausgeht, daB die Seele,
d. h. das erkennende Prinzip, kein Korper ist; gerade dieser Beweis wiirde dem
I
humana potest intelligi non esse; secus de Deo ... Scribe ergo intellectu 'non est',
sume 'est', Quid restat? Nihil. Ubi ergo precedit non-esse et sequitur esse redire
potest non-esse quoad intellectum."
19 William of Auvergne, De anima, V. 24, p. lSI a.
21
132
Aquinas' Philosophy in the Commentary on the Sentences ... p. 2). This does not
however detract from the characterization of the work as tentative, and as marked by
an effort to cite authorities in support of position. As distinct from most other works
of Aquinas, the conunentaJy is marked by these features.
omnibus animalibus accidit corruptio per hoc quod forma eorum in non ens secedit.
,.
133
Lac. cit.: "Visus enim nihil cognoscit nisi mud cujus species potest fieri in
pupilla. Unde cum non sit possibile ut organum corporale cadat medium inter
virtutem aliquam et ipsam essentiam virtutis, non erit possibile ut aliqua virtus
operans mediante organo corporali cognoscat seipsam....Ex quibus omnibus patet
quod anima intellectiva habet esse absolutum, non dependens ad corpus;' unde
corrupto corpore non corrumpitur."
4\ Philip the Chancellor, Summa de bono. 269,185 - 195
42
Albert the Great, Summa de creaturis. q. 59, 518b - 519b: ..... nulla virtus
corporea apprehendit se nec suurn instrumentum. Quod probatur per inductionem
omnium: nullum enim sensuum, eJderorum sentit se, vel instrumentum suum.
Similiter etiam in interioribus imaginatio non imaginatur se vel instrumentum suurn,
et sic est de omnibus a1iis. Et ratio hujus est, quia tales virtutes non apprehenduntur
nisi organa corporis aliquid passo: nullum. autem organum patitur a seipso, nec a
virtute quae est in ipso, quia sic semper pateretur: sed intellectus et caeterae virtutes
animae rationalis apprehendlUlt se et omnium. 'instrumenta virtutum: ergo non sunt
virtutes corporeae."
43 S. T. la. q. 87, a. 1: " .. sic seipsum intelligat intellectus noster, secundum quod fit
actu per species a sensibilibus abstractas per lumen intellectus agentis ....Non ergo
eer essentiam suam, sed per actum suurn se cognoscit intellectus noster."
cr. s. T. la, 13,2.
45 Cf. G. Verbeke, "Man as Frontier.... ," p. 219. When Owen says "that,man's
Imowledge of himself is from within" (cf. "The Unity in Aquinas' Philosophy of
Man," p. 73), it should not be understood as though man has a peculiar way of
knowing itself over and above the way of knowing other realities, be they spiritual
or material.
46 S.T., la, 87; a.3, res: "Id quod primo cognoscitur ab intellectu humano est
huiusmodi obiectumj et secundario cognoscitur ipse actus quo cognoscitur
obieeturnj et per aeturn cognoscitur ipse intellectus, cuius est perfectio ipsum
intelligere."
47 cr. A. Kenny, Aquinas on the Soul (London: Routledge, 1993), p. 122.
48 II Sententiarum. d. 19, q. 1. a.1, sol.: "Quarta positio est quam fides nostra tenet,
quod anima intellectiva sit substantia non dependens ex corpore, et quod sint plures
intellectivae substantiae secundum corporum multitudinem, et quod, destructis
corporibus, remanent separatae, non in alia corpora transelll1tesj sed in resurrectione
idem corpus numero quod deposuerat Wlaquaeque assumat."
49 J. Weisheipl, op. cit., p.'360.
" G. St. Hilaire, op. cit. p. 345.
51 A. G. Pegis, "Between Immortality and Death .. p. 2
D
'
cr. s. c. G. IT, 45, 8 and 46.
" Ibid, 50, 55.
54 A. G. Pegis, "Between Immortality and Death .. p. 2
ss
' '
S. C. G., IT, 79, n. 2.
56 Ibid., 55, 3.
57 See his Liher de anima V. 4, 50 - 77.
40
134
I
I
135
cr. s.
cr.
136
i,
i
~j
II,
"
L~
I;
II
II
137
animo disciplina. Necesse est igitur semper ut animus maneat, si semper manet
disciplina. Es autem disciplina veritas, et semper... Semper igitur animus manet, nec
animus mortuus dicitur."
lOS Summa de bono, 268, 157 - 159: "veritas in quantum huiusmodi est immortalis.
Ergo substantia eius cognoscitiva est inunortalis. Sed anima rationalis est substantia
huiusmodi; ergo est substantia immortalis."
106 De anima, VI. 3. p. 158 b. A hint of this infinite capacity to understand in the
intellect is present in such statements of Aquinas as the following: "But the possible
intellect is endowed with a certain infinite power, since by it we judge of things
infinite in number, inasmuch as by it we know universals, under which potentially
infinite particulars are contained." (S. C. O. II. 59, 8). Aquinas puts the statement in
the mouth of an objector to the possible intellect being a part of man,' even though
the idea has an important implication in his philosophy of man. As M. Brown puts it
"although at any given time one's knowledge is finite, there is no intrinsic limit to
what one can know about the universe. Aquinas says that the human being is the
matrix of the universe, the only being which is both material and immaterial." (The
Romance of Reason: An Adventure in the Thought afThomas Aquinas, St. Bede's.
Petersham, 1991, p. 77) Such statements command accent by some intuitive or
introspective feeling of each human person. The problem with it though is that since
the human being is very finite, there is no type of witness or verification that can
possibly be produced for it.
107 Cf. S. C. G., II, 75.
108
S. T., la, 75, ad 4, 5: Aquinas refers to this capacity as infinite range in the
universals. What he sometimes seems to mean is that there is theoretically no
conceivable limit to the application of universals to particulars, or again that the
soul through its general concepts can always invent alternative tools, ways of action,
etc. ''Dicendum quod anima intellectiva, qui universalium comprehensiva, habet
virtutem ad infinita ... homo habet naturaliter rationem et manus, quae sunt organa
organorum, quia per eas homo potest sibi praeparare instrumenta infinitorum
modorum, et ad infinitos effectus."
109 Cf. A. Kenny, op. cit., pp. 96 97.
110 J. de Vries, op. cit., p. 6
111 Ibid., pp. 10 - 11: "Wenn dies abgelelmt wird, miiste ein besonderer Grund
angeben werden, warum die Wesensgleichheit zwischen ErkelUltnisgegenstand und
Erkenntnisakt (bzw. Erkenntnisflihigkeit) gerade im Fall der Inuuaterialitiit
notwendig ist."
112 Ibid., p. 16.19.
113 II Sententiarum., q. 1, a. 1. sol.
114 Ch. 79, n. 5.
lIS See Gundissalinus, De immortalitate animae, pp. 28 - 29; Robert of Melun. in
R. M. Martin, op. cit. pp. 141 142; John Blund, De anima, xiv, 334; Albert the
Great, De natura et origine animae, IT.c. 6, p. 26a, 23 - 31.
116 It can indeed be said that Thomas follows the presentation of Gundissalinus who
first argues that the soul has no contrary by arguing against the composition of
cr.
138
matter and form in it. There is also a very close resemblance in the statement
accepting for the sake of the argument that the soul is composed of matter and form,
and still arguing it would even then be without contrruy. Blund and Thomas used
this line of argument. Gundissalinus link the question of contrary to knowledge by
saying ''Non est igitur destructibilis per divisionem formae a materia, cum forma
eius contrarium habere non possit, sed sit ad omnes fonnas intelligihiles,
quamadmodum hyle ad omnes visibiles." (Cf. p. 29). St. Thomas says almost the
same by referring to the mode of existence of contraries in the soul.
117 C. the%giae. c. 84, 147: "Proprium subiectum generationis et corruptionis est
materia. Intantum igitur unumquodque a corruptione recedit, inquantum recedit a
materia: ea enim quae sunt composita ex materia et forma, sunt per se corruptibilia;
formae autem materiales sunt corruptihiles per accidens, et non per se; formae
autem inunateriales, quae materiae proportionem excedunt sunt incorruptibiles
omnino. Intellectus autem omnino secundum suam naturam supra materiam
elevatur, quod eius operatio ostendit: non enim intelligirnus aliqua nisi per hoc quod
ipsa a materia separamus. Es igitur intellectus secundum naturam incorruptibilis."
118 Ibid., c. 84, 148: "Corruptio absque contrarietate esse non potest, nihil eniro
corrumpitur nisi a suo contrario: unde corpora caelestia, in quibus non est
contrarietas, soot incorruptibilia. Sed contrarietas lange est a natura intellectus, in
tantum quod ea quae sec\.Uldum se sunt contraria, in intellectus contraria non S\.Ult:
est enim contrariorum ratio intelligbilis una, quia per \.Ulurn intelligitur aHud.
Impossibile est igitur quod intellectus sit corruptibilis."
119 S. T. la, 76, a. 6.,: "Dato etiam quod anima esset ex materia et forma composita,
ut quidam dicWlt, adhuc oporteret ponere earn incorruptibilem."
120 F. D. Wilhelmsen, "A Note on Contraries and the Incorruptibility of the Human
Soul in St. Thomas Aquinas," American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly, 67
(1993), pp. 334 - 335.
I2l Ibid., pp. 337 - 338.
122 A Kenny, op. cit., p. 134.
Chapter 4
SOME PROBLEMS OF IMMORTALITY
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141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
of
being has problems not only in the context of st. Thomas' theory of
knowledge, but also in the specific meaning of the duration, the
apprehension of which is objectified in the argwnent.
When Aquinas examines the immortality of the animal souls
immediately after arguing for immortality in the Contra gentiles, he
returns again to natural desire, but then he has taken it for granted that
brute forms do not have the type of natural desire that can lead to
immortality. With this he asserts that in each thing capable of attaining a
certain perfection, there must be the desire for this perfection, and we
find in animal souls no desire for endless existence. On the contrary,
their desire is limited to apprehension and their apprehension carmot
extend beyond the here and now." Furthermore he argues that since that
which is separate is understood in act, and in that case, and in
accordance with the word of Aristotle, with separate beings that which
is understood is identical with that which understands, it would follow
. that animal souls would be intellectual if they are separate from the
body, and this too would be impossible. 24 Aquinas also swipes against
Plato's argwnent from motion, which has a consequence of affirming
the immortality of all that is self-moving. 2S He considers what Plato
means by self-motion in his argwnent, but rejects all possibilities of the
argwnent leading to the immortality of brute souls, on the supposition
that the operation of brute souls, evidenced in such activities like
sensation, is intrinsically bound up with bodily organs. Thus the
movement that Plato speaks about in the soul carmot be separated from
the organs of the body, showing again that the soul carmot have
operations that are independent of the body, which is required if it is to
be considered immortal.
In spite of the problems latent in some argwnents for immortality
arising from their possible applicability to the soul of brutes, Aquinas
shows his awareness of this problem and tries repeatedly to provide
answers to it because of the common conviction that the souls of
animals are not immortal. This is a rare procedure in the attempt to
argue for immortality in the thirteenth century, since most authors ofthe
time who wrote on immortality did not regard seriously the
consequence of any of their argwnents on other types of souls.
Alexander of Hales was in fact the first to reject an argwnent for
immortality because accepting it would also imply that the souls of
plants and animals are immortal (quia sic sensibilis et vegitabilis in
plantis essent immortalis).' The argwnent that Alexander rejects is the
one that holds that the soul is the source of life, and if so carmot be
deprived of life itself. This argwnent was very dear to Augustine, to
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151
and later sin, man is mortal. It means that naturally his soul, if immortal,
must be able to remain apart from the body in some manner.
Aquinas insists repeatedly that the union of the soul to the body is
for the good of the soul because it is there that its perfection lies.29 Still
there seems to be in his thought an enduring conflict between this idea
inspired by his reading of Aristotelian philosophy and another
inspiration coming more from the Platonic influence on his philosophy,
aided by some latent theological considerations. It is therefore not
surprising that much as Aquinas affinns the usefulness and naturalness
of the union of the body to the soul, he speaks in some places as though
the body is a burden and that it is only with liberation from it that the
soul comes to the perfection that is proper to its nature.' Sometimes it
is placed in the context of a direct vision of God," but the awareness of
the implication of this for Aquinas, the theologian, displays more
clearly the tension between the natural and the supernatural in his
philosophy of the soul and its separation from the body.
However, wherever specifically this tension nudges St. Thomas, he
still retains the conviction that the separated soul does not lose its
nature, i.e. it is still the human soul in its separation from the body and
does not therefore suddenly acquire a nature it did not possess
previously. Two issues merit our attention against the teaching of the
sameness of nature in the united and separated soul. In the first place,
whence does the separated soul derive its individuation, and what
happens to its ability to know which constitutes one of the pillars of its
perfection?" J. Mundhenk examines briefly the problems associated
with the separated soul, and concludes that the picture one derives from
Aquinas' thought on it is fragmented, and wonders whether the author
himself regards the result of his researches as insufficient or whether he
intends each of these attempts to appear in a fragmented manner to us. 33
What Mundhenk does not point out is that the enquiry is almost bound
to be as he describes it because of the question at stake. Before the
problem of the soul in separation from the body, there is evidently no
help from Aristotelian philosophy available to the angelic doctor. There
is also no help from the common human intuition on which he depends
so much in arguing for immortality. So either he draws the
consequences that are latent in the philosophy of nature of Aristotle,
which he follows very closely in outlining the nature of the soul, and
with the help of which he argues further for its immortality, or he brings
in other convictions that are extrinsic to this philosophy from faith and
theology. But the second option does not present any wide area of
choice of means, for, according to St. Paul, the state of the soul after
death is not so clear to the human being subject to the limitations of his
nature. In reality, Thomas mainly retains the conclusions of his natural
philosophy and tries to extend deductively their implications to the
separated soul, then shifts here and there to other grounds which are not
very much in consonance with his philosophy. If from Thomas' point of
view such a procedure is not contradictory, at least it projects a picture
that is not easy to understand and integrate completely.
For St. Thomas, matter is the principle of individuation. Even though
materia signata quantitate does not for him explain all about why
human beings are multiple, there is no doubt that it is at least the
material cause of individuation in man. It therefore remains true to the
spirit of Aquinas that there is no other thing in the soul by which it is
individuated." The fonnal principle of multiplicity is other than matter.
It is the substantial fonn. But the part matter plays is essential in this
process. If, as Elders says, "individuality consists in a proper mode of
the specific essence in respect of the other individuals of a species""
how is one individual soul separated from the body distinguishable from
the other if they belong to the same species? It cannot be that, like
angels, each separated soul belongs to a different species. The question
is already raised as an objection to immortality, and in response to it,
Aquinas refers to the proportion that must exist between a particular
fonn and its matter, and a commensuration of souls to their bodies. It
means that, on separation, the soul retains its proportionality, and its
commensuration to a particular body, which is however not caused by
this body, but must be a prior fitness to be united to the body.
By this theory, Aquinas achieves the effect of not making the body
as such exercise in its own right a detennination on the essential nature
of the soul as individual, for that would entail that a lower being is
somehow an active agent in the production of a higher spiritual being.
In further explanation of the fonnal source of individuality, he gives the
example of two fires which, though possessing different fonns, have the
same essential principle. It would seem however that this example does
not solve the problem involved. Different fires must have different
substrates on which to inhere unless they are substantive fires, which is
difficult to comprehend.. Being in different substrates (their fuel" for
example), they must also be in different places, and consuming different
oxygen to keep them burning. These are material things that surround
the being of fire, which cannot go with the nature of the separated soul.
A similar problem arises when wax is given as an example of how
individuation follows the separated soul irrespective of the body.'" If
the commensuration or proportionality of the soul to the body is enough
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to account for multiplicity and individuation, what role does the body
play in the matter? Such a question is not discussed as such by Aquinas,
and there is a cacophony of voices on what he exactly taught on the
question of individuation. For the moment however, let us note that the
fitness of the soul for a particular body plays a significant role in the
doctrine of the resurrection.
A more intractable problem however is the operational status of the
soul in the state of separation. The issue is raised in several places in the
text where Aquinas argues for immortality." The point at issue in all
cases is the objection that each being must have its specific operation,
and the special operation of the soul, knowing, is intrinsically linked
with the body. How then does the soul continue in knowledge if it is
separated from the body and thus deprived of the long process at the
end of which intellectual knowledge results in the noetics of Aquinas?
The fleeting answers he gives to such objections are always that the soul
will have another mode of operation when separated from the body. But
he is deeply aware of the problems involved and it is in connection with
this question that he expressly admits that a question is very difficult."
His analysis of the difficulty shows how a Platonic conception of the
soul would have solved the problem, for then separation would be a
liberation from the impediment of the body, and the soul would receive
its species purely and directly from a higher source. But such a solution
would not be suitable to him because it goes against a very important
principle: that the union of the soul and the body is for the good of the
soul, as matter is in general meant to serve the fonn.
As the soul in Aquinas' teaching has operations independent of the
body, it is possible also to think of a situation where it would depend on
the knowledge it has already acquired while joined to the body, and
perhaps through reflection and meditation, with such knowledge as
foundation, maintain some activity which takes care of the difficulty of
conceiving a being without its proper activity. He takes adequate
account of the knowledge which the rational soul acquires while it is
united to the body. Nevertheless, limiting the intellectual operation of
the soul to what it knows already would have many consequences. First
there will be the problem of what knowledge it would have of higher
beings including God in the separated state, and again it would be
difficult to see how such knowledge would be restrained only to what
the soul was able to acquire in the body. Further, rational souls which
cannot acquire much knowledge, or those which do not acquire
knowledge at all while on earth would then not be immortal or would be
limited to stunted existence. In general, however, given that knowledge
is the perfection of the human soul, there will still remain the problem
of whether the separated soul is in a better or worse state than when
united with the body. It is not certain yet that Aquinas would
unequivocally admit that life in the composite of the body is in every
case better for the soul, as we have already seen. The choice is then
open whether to conclude that given the persistence of the nature of the
soul, its capacity for knowledge remains as when incorporated, or that
the soul has now a new mode of knowing different from the fonner
natural mode. Our view is that through all his works, Aquinas retains
the two positions, and here and there he makes a significant shift from
one to the other.
This view is a bit different from the conclusion of Pegis in his study
?f the nature of the separated soul in the works of Aquinas. Pegis
Identifies a real change in the position of st. Thomas from the
beginning of his career when he held 'a position very much preAristotelian to the time he wrote the Summa theologiae by which time
the Aristotelian notion of nature has entered into his discussion and
replaced the fonner position held in the Contra gentiles. "The emphasis
on the role of nature in characterising the embodied and separated states
of the soul is a new -and Aristotelian - development in the teaching of
St. Thomas. ,,39 He carefully traces the change of position through some
important works of Aquinas, and groups the works under these two
poles. The Commentary on the Sentences, the De veritate and the
Compendium theologiae contain the same teaching that is found in the
Contra Gentiles, and the later revised position is advocated in the
Summa theologiae and the De anima." For our purpose, let us
concentrate our review of the two positions of St Thomas on the Summa
the%giae, and Summa contra gentiles which mark the two main poles
between which the change takes place.
In the Summa contra gentiles, Aquinas' response to the supposition
of the impossibility of the soul to exist outside the body on account of
its inability to know without phantasm is that the soul has a different
mode of understanding when in the body and when separated from it.
The principl~ that grounds this assertion is that a being acts in
accordance With the way it exists (unumquodque enim secundum hoc
agit secundum quod estl). From here, Aquinas admits the natural mode
of knowledge of the soul. Even though the soul has its own act of
existence independent of the body, it understands only through the
phantasm while in the body. This way of understanding perishes when
the composite dies. However, the soul, which has its own independent
act of understanding, will not fulfil this with reference to the phantasm,
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157
but will understand itself like substances that are not w1ited at all to the
body. Again the soul will receive an inundation of intelligibles through
these spiritual substances, and thus understand even more perfectly than
when it was in the body. A series of quaint illustrations attempt to
clarii)' these otherwise un-argued assertions: the more the soul is freed
from the body, the more it is able to understand higher things. Sleeping
persons are able to perceive the future from higher beings; the same
experience is observed in fainting and ecstasy, since these involve a
good deal of withdrawal from the body. From all these, the angelic
doctor concludes that when the soul departs from the body, it will be
completely similar to other spiritual substances that are not w1ited to the
body and will also acquire their mode of understanding and receive
sufficient influx from these.42
It is clear from the explanation of the way of knowing in the
separated rational soul that Aquinas has no space at all for all his former
theories about the nature of the soul and its activity. In fact, he virtually
abandons the whole issue of the soul as form of the body on which his
whole philosophy of man is based. The soul is assimilated to the status
of angels. As a being acts the way it exists and exists the way it acts,
one can easily argue that as the soul understands like angels, it could be
counted as one of them. Furthermore, the continued exercise of the act
of understanding by the soul is assured by the abundant influx of
species from higher beings, and as such influx is from superior beings,
the knowledge of the soul in this state must be, if anything, more
perfect. Aquinas' view in the Contra gentiles represents clearly the
strand of thought in Aquinas in which the soul is understood as reaching
its fulfilment with separation. It is important that there is hardly any
better argument for the position except that a thing acts the way it
exists. Here the corruption of an important part of the nature of the soul,
its way of understanding, is qulte compatible with immortality.
When the angelic doctor comes to the Summa theologiae, this
perspective completely changes. The question is the same, but put in a
more direct mrumer: utrum anima separata aliquid intelligere possil.
The objector clarifies the issues at stake. First the human soul is
impeded in understanding by the influence of the senses and by the
disturbance of the imagination. If then at death these organs are
completely destroyed, there is no reason to suppose that the soul will
continue to know without them. Again the separated soul, if it
understands, must do so through species. Such species caunot come
from itself since it is from origin devoid of any. It caunot also be
species abstracted from objects of knowledge, having lost all the powers
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160
It is also in connection with this that the basic principle of his theology
meets the most important human hope in the Christian revelation. The
earlier teaching of Aquinas on the relationship between the body and
the soul reaches its ultimate consequence in its application as a
justification of the resurrection of the body. In that teaching, which is
inspired by Aristotle but goes much further than him, Aquinas holds
that the two principles in the human being are so united that they have
one single existence. It means that ontologically, the life of the body is
the same as the life of the soul, even if that life, in a way, flows down to
the body from the soul. Thus there is room for some kind of
subordination of the body to the soul, since the union is for the good of
the soul, just as, in general, matter is for the sake of fonn. Because the
life of the composite is, so to say, lent to it by the soul, and because the
soul enjoys some operations in which it has no need of any bodily
organ, it is said to be self-subsistent and immortal. In spite of this
special characteristic, which sets the soul apart in the world offonns, it
is by nature adapted for union with the body in which lies its means of
perfection. It is because of this natural ordination that the soul must
receive phantasms from the body in order to lmow, and it is in
lmowledge that its perfection consists. On account of its ability for selfsubsistence, the soul at the death of the composite can live apart from
the body. However, this is not its due mode of existence. Hence
contrary to the vision of some passages of the Holy Scripture, the soul
separated from the body lives in a sort of exile. And even if it is given
another means of lmowing from the spiritual being, it still carves an
image which resembles that of an impostor occupying an office which
legally and by natural endowment it is not fit to occupy. Its lmowledge
in this state, even though received from superior intelligibles, remains
general and confused because it is praeter naturam.
Because its new mode of existence is unsuitable to its nature, the
separated soul is thus in constant yearuing for its natural abode, and this
requires a reunion with its proper body, a continuation of its nonnal
mode of existence, an existence in which its perfection is ensured. This
natural necessity finds expression in the Christian doctrine of the
resurrection. What is new here is that the resurrection is a natural
requirement, explicable by an ingeuious interpretation of Aristotelian
philosophy. There is no juggling of Aristoteliauism in which the
concept of the resurrection can be made understandable to the unaided
reason. Aquinas does not entertain any illusion about this fact. In the
very passage in which he tries to give some philosophical reflections on
the question of the resurrection, he underlines that it is a dogma of the
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intrinsically bound up with the body, for its nonna1 existence and its
perfection. In the passage on the resurrection, the tenn contra naturam
is used instead of the more benign praeter naturam of the Summa
theologiae. The latter tenn applies in relation to the knowledge of the
soul in separation which, though coming from a superior source, is not
in cousonance with its nature. It is because the available mode of
exercising its being is beyond its nonna1 capacity, giving it ouly
confused and general knowledge that it is against nature: contra
naturam.
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provides that man, whose reason remains submissive to his creator will
be immortal. The resurrection is, in the final analysis, a basic dogma of
faith, and not a comfortable subject for mere philosophical review.
4.5 Immortality and the Platonism of Aquinas
That Aquinas was able to bring resurrection and immortality very
close, while retaining the levels of thought to which each of these
belongs, is a fine indicator of the expanse of his philosophical
enterprise. It is an enterprise that is grand both in its conception and
execution, and no other factor attests more to this than the fact that he
departs from the mainly Aristotelian standpoint, trying through the
length and breadth of his thought to retain his personal understanding of
that standpoint, while at the same time arguing strenuously for a
position that is best served by the philosophy of Plato. It is almost
natural that the result of such an engagement, "though expressed in the
language of form and matter, is native to the world of St. Thomas and
cannot exist in the world of Aristotle."" If this aspect of Aquinas is
included in what Reyna describes as "manoeuvring philosophy into the
theological position,"" one must not fail to remember that the whole
issue of immortality has been native to philosophy almost from the
point of its inception. The philosophical system that almost gave birth
to and nurtured the tradition of arguing for the after-life of the human
soul is Platonic. And if we go to Plato himself, the religious influence
which his tradition was loaded with in its passage through history is not
very much traceable to Plato himself, except perhaps in the
hermeneutical sense in which H.-G. Gadamer describes Plato's
arguments in the Phaedo as a reaction to the scientific enlightenment of
his time. 60 Despite the historical and doctrinal affinity of the question of
immortality with Platonism, Aquinas expressly sets aimost every aspect
of his theory on. the theme, both in terms of its background doctrines
and aimost the specific argument proffered as proof against different
positions of Plato. His counter-positions are easily legible in some of
the major themes: the soul as form, the origin and development of
knowledge, the importance given to the body in its general relation with
the soul, etc. But if the grandeur of Aquinas' project lies in this stance
against Plato, how successful was he in freeing himself from the
trappings of Plato's system?
Our brief review of the outcome of Aquinas' project will be set
against the barest essence of Platonism. Historically, Platonism
gathered a lot of accretions through its long presence and influence that
165
166
Aquinas states this in an attempt to argue for the conforming of the soul
to its natural state of existence, which speaks more for his
Aristotelianism.3 However the admission that the soul after separation
can have other means of knowing, even from grace, seems to revert the
clear naturalism to something akin to the Platonic view. This reading is
ouly helped by such statements as that man thinks by his soul,64 or again
that the soul rules the body despotically.s Though they do not consign
Aquinas to Platonism on the grounds of the context in which they are
found, they are ouly signs that in fact he is not so free of Plato as his
expression may sometimes seem to indicate.
Something similar can be said about the theory of matter as the
principle of individuation. Though the question of individuation is very
much disputed among scholars of St. Thomas, it is clear that he
attributes matter a role in the individuation of the soul. But this role is
not as thoroughgoing as that of Aviceuna. Still the role that Aquinas
gives to the body is not something that Plato would accept as a normal
relation between body and soul. Nevertheless the theory of
individuation is presented in such a way that the body all alone is not
what makes the soul individuated or multiple. The nature of the soul
itself plays an important part, constituting the formal principle of
multiplicity. That entails in fact that without matter, the soul maintains
its multiplicity and individuation. This retrieval of individuation within
the very nature of the soul suits the defence of inunortality admirably,
for if indeed the body all alone was responsible for the individuated
condition of the soul, a question could arise as to how this effect of the
body on the soul goes on long after the separation of the two. It
however presents a picture of the soul that conforms very well to a
return to the world of ideas where the soul continues to exist in its real
world.
That extraterrestrial world of Plato is one from which real,
unchangeable knowledge originates. The employment in Aquinas of the
phenomenon of knowing to defend the nature of the soul and especially
its inunortality draws very close to this view of knowledge as something
that is substantive and able to exist on its own. It must be said for him
however that in many places, he concentrates on the process of
knowledge instead of knowledge itself. But it is also true that he
presents universals of knowledge as having independent existence, by
considering their existence not in relation to their nature as bound with
their subject, the rational soul. The first presentation66 of the state of the
separated soul tends to give full support to this view of knowledge
which smacks of the view of Plato. The soul in separation receives more
perfect knowledge from sublime forms, just as the one which has left
the hindering material world in Plato's system. In the second
presentation, Aquinas seems to have come back to the dominance of
Aristotelianism. But there is the need, even in the new and more
Aristotelian interpretation, for the soul to keep on in activity, since
activity in being is one of the demands of reasonable inunortality for the
soul. It is therefore necessary that the basic thrust of the state of
separated soul in the Summa contra gentiles is retained: the soul can
still receive more perfect forms directly from spiritual beings, but a
concession to its nature is that such knowledge presented as perfect for
the soul, now becomes general and confused, except where the grace of
God provides perfect knowledge for the glorified souls.
The foundation of this inconvenience though is Aquinas' view about
the substantiality of the soul. Aquinas does not directly call the soul a
substance. It is a hoc aliquid in the sense that a part of a whole can be
said to be a hoc aliquid. 67 This means that it can subsist on its own
independent of the body on grounds of its ability to perform acts that do
not require bodily organs and are independent of the body. However,
the full understanding of the soul is not very much different from that of
a substance. For this reason commentators on Aquinas have often
described the soul as incomplete substance. 8 It is usually employed in
reference to separated souls which though able to exist on its own does
not attain its complete fulfilment outside the body, and thus yearns for
reunion, under which condition it will resume its function of giving life
to the body, while receiving species from material things. The notion of
incomplete substance is bound up with some obscurity. It is not clear in
what the incompleteness of substance consists, or whether between
substance and accidents, there is room for a category that is neither
accident nor substance. Aquinas describes the existence of the soul
outside its natural habitat as contra naturam, and the knowledge it can
receive is described as praeter naturam. That means that its new estate
is not in accord with its nature. But does it also mean that it is
incomplete in the species of substance? Aquinas says that the soul is a
part, not a whole. In that sense, it can be said to be incomplete. The
problem of his teaching is how such a part can exist and do all that it is
required to do as a subsistent entity. However, given that it is able to
live in that state independently, the yearuing for and the adaptation to
the body that still persists in it does not make it answerable to the
description of incomplete substance. In the sense of the lack that
accompanies the separated souls, all finite imperfect beings have lacks
in their nature that create a' yearuing for the ultimate. In that respect,
167
168
only God can be complete substance with the fullness of being on its
own. The only option is to regard the soul as an exCeption, defying most
of the general principles govern1og physical things and forms in
Aristotelian philosophy. However some aspects of the exception bring
the theory very close to Platonic theories.
In conclusion, Aquinas attempts to apply the doctrines of his
philosophical mentor Aristotle to the issue of innnortaiity. The result
though is very much pre-Aristotelian in many of its aspects. He draws
conclusions which are neither Aristotelian nor really Platonic. His
defence of innnortality with the basic tools of Aristotelian philosophy is
a bold effort which he is the first to make in the thirteenth century world
where the novelty of Aristotle was revered before him. Still the
execution of that project gives so many concessions to Platonic
inspiration" that it can be described as mediation between the two
giants of ancient Greek philosophy.
NOTES
169
Ibid., 1a 2ae 85, 6, resp.: "Sed Deus, qui subjacet omnis natura, in ipsa
institutione hominis supplevit defectum naturae; et dono justitiae originalis
dedit corpori incorruptibilitatem quamdam.... "
10 Ibid., la, 95, 1. resp.
II Ibid., la, 97,1. resp.: "Nee enim corpus ejus erat indissolubile per aliquam
immortalitatis vigorem in eo existentem; sed inerat animae vis quaedam
supematuraliter divinitus data, per quam poterat corpus ab omni corruptione
praeservare quamdiu ipsa Deo subjecta rnansisset. Quod rationaliter factum est.
Quia enim anima rationalis excedit proportionem corporalis materiae, ut supra
dictum est; conveniens fuit ut in principio ei virtus daretur per quam corpus
conservare posset supra naturant corporalis materiae."
12
Cf. M. Baumgartner, Die Erkenntnislehre des Wilhelms von Auvergne,
Beitrage II, I (MOnster, 1893), p. 20: "Als Theologe beschliftigt er sich mit
besonderer Vorliebe mit dem Erkenntniszu'stand des Menschen vor der SUnde."
13 William of Auverge, De anima, V. 18, p. 143b: "Nunc autem, hoc est
tempore miseriae et corruptionis praesentis, necesse habent animae hwnanae
mendicare a rebus sensibilibus per sensus cognitiones eorum sensibus propter
obtenebrationes virtutis intellectivae, quae ad exteriora particularia et sensibilia
penitus caeca est et ad illa omnino non attingens nisi sensibus adiuta et
aliquatenus illuminata."
14 A. C. Pegis, "Between Immortality and Death,", p. 8
15 S. T., la, 75, 3, resp.: "Sentire vero et consequentes operationes animae
sensitivae manifeste accidunt cum aliqua corporis inunutatione, sicut in
videndo inunutatur pupilla per speciem coloris (et idem apparet in aliis). Et sic
manifestum est quod anima sensitiva non habet aliquam operationem propriam
per seipsam, sed onmis operatio sensitivae animae est conjuncti. Ex quo
relinquitur quod cum animae brutorum animalium per se non operentur, non
sint subsistentes smiliter enim unumquodque habet esse et operationem."
16 S. T. la, 75, 6 ad. 1.
17 Cf. Ibid., la, 45, 5; S. C. G. II, 87.
18 Q. Quodlibetales. 10, q. 3, a. 2, ad. 1.
19 S. T., 13, 75, 5, resp.: "Dicendum quod anima non habet materiam. Et hoc
potest considerari dupliciter. Primo quidem, ex ratione animae in communi. Est
enirn de ratione animae sit fonna alicujus corporis. Aut igitur est forma
secundum se totam aut secundum aliquam partem sui. Si secundum se totam,
impossibile est quod pars ejus sit materia, si dicatur materia aUquod ens in
potentia tantum. Quia fonna, inquantum forma, est actus. Id autem quod est in
potentia tantum non potest esse pars actus, cum potentia repugnet actui, utpote
contra actwn divisa. Si autero sit fonna secundum aliquam partem sui, illam
partern dicemus esse animam, et ilIanl rnateriam cujus primo est actus dicemus
esse primwn animatum."
20 Cf. S. C. G., II, 55, n. 13.
21 Reference is also made to the incorruptibility of the heavenly bodies in
Aquinasarguments in the Summa theologiae (la, 75, 6). T. Suttor points out
9
170
the theological interest of the theory which he describes as "quaint": ~tter and
incorruptibility cannot be takeo as incompatible since the resurrection ~f the
body after which the body will have to live forever does not pemut the
assertion of such incompatibility.
22 Confessions, XI.
23 S. C. G., II, 83, 4
24 Ibid., 83, 3.
,
25 Ibid., 83, 9 19. The argument from motion is the mai~ thrust of Pl~to. s
proof of immortality in the Phaedrns (245C - 246A find) ~Icero employs It m
the Somnium Scipionis, and became well known tn the Middle Ages through
Macrobius' commentruy on the work of Cicero.
26 Alexander of Hales, Questiones, 1, 32,28, 26 ~ 27
27 Cf. S. T., la, 47,1,2.
28 S.C. G., 68, 12.
29 Cf. De spirt. creal., 2, ad 5: "Anima, cum sit pars humanae naturae, non
habet perfectionem suae naturae nisi in unione ad corpus," .De unilate
intellectus. p. 333 b (In ed. Marietti): "Concedimus autem quod anIma h:mrnna
a corpore separata non habet ultimam perfecti~nem suae na~ae, cum. SIt pars
naturae humane; nulla enim pars habet ommmodam perfectionem, SI a toto
separetur.": S. T., la, 90, 4c: "Anima autem, cum sit pars humanae naturae,
non habet naturalem perfectionem, nisi secundum quod est coropori unita."
30 Cf. Exp.super librum Boethii de Tinitate, 1, I, ad. 4: "In nobis autem lumen
hujusmodi est obumbratum per conjunctionem ad corpus et ad vires corpor~as,
et ex hoc impeditur, ut non possit libere veritatem etiam naturahter
cognoscibilem inspicere"; III, I, c: "Quaedam vero divinorum sunt, ad q?~e
plene cognoscenda nullatenus ratio hwnana sufficit, sed eorum plena COgnltlO
exspectatur in futura vita, ubi erit plena beatitudo."
31 S, T .. , la, 12, 11, c: "Ab homine puro Deus videri non potest nisi ab hac vita
mortali separetur."
32 Cf. S. C. G.
79, 3: "Perficitur enim anima scientia et virtute... "
33 J. Mundhenk, Die Seele in System des Thomas von Aquin (Hamburg: Felix
Meiner, 1980), p. 128.
34 Sent. I, d. 8., q. 5,2 ad 6: "In anima non est aliquid quo ipsa individuetur."
3S L. Elders, The Philosophy ofNature ofSt. Thomas Aquinas, p. 143
l6 See J. Mundhenk, op. cit., pp. 126 - 127
37 A text that presents the problem very well is the following: "si anima potest
a corpore separari, oportet quod sit aliqua operatio eius sin~ corp~re, 00' quod
nulla substantia est otiosa. Sed nulla operatio potest esse anlmae sme corpore,
neque etiam intelligere, de quo magis videtur; quia non est intelligere sine
phantasmate, ut Philosophus dicit: phantasma autem non est sine corpore. Ergo
anima non potest separari a corpore, sed corrumpitur corrupto corpore."
38 ST., la, 89, 1, resp.: "Dicendum quod ista quaestio difficultatem habet ex
hoc quod anima, quamdiu est corpori conjuncta, non potest aliquid intelligere
nisi convertendo se ad phantasmata, ut per experimentum patet, Si autem hoc
n.
171
no~ est ex .natura ani~e, sed per accidens hoc convenit ei ex eo quod corpori
alhgatur, SICut PlatonIcl posuerunt, de facili quaestio solvi posset. Nam remota
impedimento corporis, rediret anima ad suam naturam ut inteIligeret
intelligibilia simpliciter, Don convertendo se ad phantasmata 'sieut est de aliis
sub~tantii~ separ~tis..Se~ secu.ndwn hoc, non esset anima cori>ori wlita propter
mehus arumae, SI ~eJus tntelhgeret corpori Wlita quam separata; sed hoc esset
solum propter mehus corporis: quod est irrationabile, cum materia sit propter
formam, et non e converso."
39 A. C. Pegis, "The Separated Soul and its Nature in St. Thomas," in St.
Tho,!,as AqUinas (12741974): Commemorative Studies (Toronto: Pontifical
J:,'stltute of~ediaeval Studies, 1974), vol. 1, p. 137.
.F.or Pegls, the change of doctrine about the separated soul has a very
deCIsive consequence. He draws this consequence from his conviction that the
change is defmite: "The introduction of the intellectual nature of the Soul as
the essential factor in dealing with the way in which the soul knows is a
de~isive chan~e in St. Thomas' .attitude towards he separated souL" p. 137.
This lea,ds PegI~ to s~ggest dates tn the works of Aquinas taking accoWlt of this
change m dO"?,,,e WIth ';he belief that it is not likely that Aquinas goes back to
the. old doctrine after hIS change of attitude. He thus argues against all the
datmgs that ,:"ould make ",:,y of the work in which Aquinas holds the pre;}'istotehan vIew to be later m writing. Cf. esp., pp. 150 _ 158.
S. C. G., 81, 12.
42 .Ib~d., .81. 12: 'V~?e et, quando totaliter erit a corpore separata, perfecte
~slmIl~bltur substant~ls separatis quantum ad modum intelligendi, et abunde
tnfiuentlam eorum reclpiet."
43 S. T., la, 89, 1. obj. 2, 3,
44 Ibid. 89, 1, resp.: "Unde modus intelligendi per conversionem ad
phantasmata est animae naturalis, sicut et corpori uniri: sed esse separatum a
corpore. est praeter rationem suae naturae, et similiter intelligere sine
converSlOne ad phantasmata est ei praeter naturam. Et idoe ad hoc unitur
corpori, ut sit et operetur secWldum naturam suam."
" Ibid, 89, 1. resp.: ''Et ideo ad hanc difficultatem tollendam considerandum
est. quo.d, cum .nihil ,operetur nisi inquantum est aetu, ~odus operandi
lUl1USCuJusque rei sequitur modum essendi ipsius. Habet autem anima alium
modum essendi ~um unitur corpori, et cum fuerit a corpore separata, manente
tamen .eadem ammae natura; non ita quod uniri corpori sit ei accidentale, sed
per rationem suae naturae corpori unitur; . . . Animae igitur secWldum illum
modum ~ssendi quo corpori est unita, competit modus intelligendi per
conversatlOnem ~d phantasmata corpororum, quae in corporeis organis sunt:
cum aute.m fuent a corpore separata, competit ei modus intelligendi per
conversatlonem ad ea quae sunt intelligibilia simpliciter sicut et aliis
substantiis separatis."
,
46 Lo
't "M .,
C. Cl .:
anllestum est autem inter substantias intellectuaies secundum
naturae ordinem, infirmas esse animas humanas. Hoc autem perfec~io Wliversi
172
exigebat, ut diversi gradus in rebus essent. Si i~tur an~e hum~.e sic ess~t
institutae a Deo ut intelligerent per modum qUI competit SubStantIlS separatls,
non haberet cognitionem perfectam, sed confusam in conununi. Ad hoc er~o
quod perfectam et propriam cognitionem de rebus h~bere p.os~ent, SIC
naturaliter sunt intitutae ut corporibus uniantur, et SIC ab IPSIS rebus
sensibitibus propriam de eis cognitionem accipiant; sicut homines rudes ad
scientiam induci non possunt nisi per sensibilia exempla. Sic ergo p~tet quod
propter melius animae est ut corpori uniatur, et intelligat per convers.ation~ a~
phantasmata; et tamen esse potest separata, et alium modum mtelhgendl
habere."
47 Cf. Ibid., 89, 2 - 4.
48 Ibid., 89, 2, ad. 3: " ... in cognitione substantiarwn. sep~atum. non
quanuncumque, consistit ultima hominis felicitas, sed sohus Del, qUi non
. .
.
"
potest videri nisi per gratiam."
49 This is the position that A. C. Pegis defends m hiS article The S.epara~ed
Soul and its Nature.... " Pegis believes that in this question we are W1tnessmg
with a major change in position about an important. is~ue (151),. and that
consequently St. Thomas having arrived at the naturalIst Interpretation of the
separated so~l, he could not have gone back in works like ~~ Qu'!'!libet, said
to be written after part one of the Summa theologiae. Pegts position IS very
much supported by the improbability of Aquinas returning to the old doctrine,
but it may wen be that Aquinas does not see the change as senously as Pegls
sees it and the presence of the two modes of explaining the soul in separation
which 'we have alluded to may have nudged him. even as a slip to put again the
position of the Contra gentiles in the Quodlibet.
so S. C. G. IV, 79, 4.
51 S.T. 3a, 56, 1.
" S. C. G. IV, 79, 10 : "Ostendum est enim in Secundo (c.79) animas
hominum immortales esse. Remanent igitur post corpora. a corporibus
absolutae. Manifestum est etiam ex his quae in Secunda (cc. 83, 68) dicta s~t,
quod anima COlpori naturaliter uniter: est ~im secundum suam essentl.~
corporis forma. Est igitur contra naturam antmae absque corpore esse. Nih~l
autem quod est contra naturam, potest esse perpetuum, Non igitur perp~~o ent
anima absque corpore. Cum igitur perpetuo maneat, oportet eam carpon I~erato
caniungi: quod est resurgere. Immortalitas igitur animarum exigere vldetur
resurrectionem corporum futuram."
" I ad Corinthios, 15 L 2.
.
54 S.C.G., IV, 79, 11 "Ostensum est supra, ... naturale hominis desiderium ad
fe1icitatem tendere. Felicitas autem ultima est felicis perfectio. Cuicumque
igitur deest aliquid ad perfectionem, nond~ habet felicitate~ pe~ectam quia
nondum eius desiderium totaliter qUletatur: omne emm Imperfectum
perfectionem consequi naturaliter cupit. Anima autem a corpor~ separata. est
aliquo modo imperfecta, sicut omnis pars extra suum totum eXlstens: anona
enim naturaliter est pars humanae naturae. Non igitur potest homo ultimam
173
~ Ibid., la, 75, a 2 ad 2: "Potest igitur dici quod anima intelligit, sicut oculus
Vldet; sed magis proprie dicitur quod homo intelligit per animam "
"Ibid,la,81,2ad2..
.
66 That is, the view that is presented in the S. C. GIl, 81, Commentary on the
Sentences, ill, d, 5, q. 3, a 2; De veritate' 19 and Quodlibet III , q 9 , a I
67
S. T., la, 75, 3, ad. 1: "Unde manus potest dici ,,hoc aliquid" primo modo
sed non .s~cundo I?o~o. Sic igitur, cum anima humana sit pars speciei humanae,
p.otest. dlCl hoc abqwd promo modo, quasi subsistens; sed non secundo modo,
c emm co~positum ex anima et corpore elicitur "hoc aliquie."
See for mstance F. C. Copleston, Aquinas, p. 160; F. D. Wilhelmsen, "A
note on Contranes ad the Incorruptibility of the Human Soul in St. Thomas" p
:i
, .
n~
Chapter 5
AQIDNAS, IMMORTALITY AND THE
SCOPE OF PIDLOSOPHY
176
177
178
argue for its immortality. We have seen that the tenn incomplete
substance is often used in such a way as to suggest a sort of
intennediate existence between complete substance and accident. S The
soul's seeking for union with the body in separation, and for return to its
natural habitat (which is very often cited as an indication of its
incompleteness as a substance) may not be much different from the
quest in a finite being for something else. This quest, which is
actualized by drive in different directions of existence, is more of an
expression of finitude, and does not indicate that finite beings are
incomplete substances.
To Aquinas, the question of what type of immortality applies to the
soul is also a very important matter. Its importance is not only seen
from his slim treatise against the proponents of the unicity of the
intellect, but throughout the course of his discussion of immortality, the
significance of the matter to his project comes out clearly either in the
text on immortality itself or in the placement of the discussions on the
question of the unicity of the human intellect.' His basic position is that
the right interpretation of Aristotle would lead to the support of
personal immortality, even though it is generally accepted that Aristotle
nowhere subscribes openly to this theory. All chronologies of the work
of Aquinas show that this concern is quite early in his thought, starting
as far back as his commentary on the Books of Sentences. It points to
7
the commencement of a fresh understanding of the work of Averroes in
the thirteenth century, and another direction in the whole issue of
immortality. Before Thomas, there was hardly any attempt (except
perhaps in st. Albert's De unitate) to reflect on what type of immortality
was acceptable to their project. It must be noted however that hardly
any of the earlier authors of the century who wrote on immortality
understood the consequence of the so-called collective immortality, and
would conceivably have rejected it if it ever became a point of
contention.
We also said earlier that Aquinas believed in the cumulative effect of
the many arguments which he marshalled for immortality to achieve
convincing effect, notwithstanding that this can be said more
specifically of the Contra gentiles, due to the circumstances
surrounding the origin of the work. The method of enumeration is what
most authors before st. Albert followed. It consists in simply calling to
witness all sorts of possible evidence in support of immortality, with the
apparent conviction that, taken separately, these pointers to the
rationality of the doctrine may not possess enough convincing power.
Very often absurd statements are made in this regard, for example,
179
when William of Auvergue writes that even vice, which can be said to
be the disease of the rational soul, does not lead to its demise, but that
vicious inclinations of souls are even strengthened the more they are
8
steeped in vice. This for William shows that the soul does not die,
otherwise its life would have been reduced by vice which is like ill
health in the rational soul. With Albert, there is a marked discernment,
which consigns some proof to mere signs, and others to probable
arguments. His handling of the question may have also been helped by
La Rochelle's grouping of proofs into rationes propriae and rationes
commune in the question of immortality, and by Alexander of Hales
who completely, and for the first thne, rejects an argument which some
authors use in favour of immortality. It must be conceded that in this
respect, Aquinas does not seem to have in any clear way risen to the
challenge set by some of his immediate predecessors.
However, the issue of neglecting important weighing of the
argument by his predecessors should not be overemphasized. An aspect
of Aquinas' argument for immortality that has not been adverted to is
the motive for his selection of arguments. Though there is no single
argument for immortality that is not traceable to his immediate
predecessors, it is easy to neglect that he does not make use of all the
arguments that are available in the sources present to him. Two
examples are enough to prove this point. First, there is the argument
from the creation of man in the image of God (imago dei). The
argument is generally presented in the fonn of the affirmation that man
is made in the image of God, and this would be false if indeed man were
to be mortal. It is found almost everywhere in the long tradition of
discussions on immortality among Christian writers beginning from the
patristic period. Cassiodorus, Hughes of St. Victor, Aicher of
Clairvaux, William of Auvergue, Alexander of Hales and Odo Rigaldus
etc mention it. Thomas, on the other hand, makes just one obvious
reference to it in a sed contra in the De anima. The preponderance of
the argument in the. thirteenth century makes it very unlikely that he is
unaware of its presence. Again the part that the doctrine of man as the
image of God plays in his thought on man is very well known" Why
then does he not make any serious use of it? One possible reason is that
Aquinas intended to prove immortality from the philosophical
standpoint alone. As Copleston says, he is very strongly convinced that
the power of reason can lead to an acceptable demonstration of the
teaching. to Given that the ultimate support of the imago dei argument is
a direct reference to the passage on creation in the Genesis, it is
reasonable to suppose that this argument does not fit very well into the
180
181
182
183
184
soul is mortal, it does not also imply that they have proved this by their
arguments. It is not possible to demonstrate that the soul is immortal;
what can be shown is that it is possible that the soul is immortal. The
authority of philosophers does not therefore lead to any measure of
certainty because they do not always give rational demonstration of
everything they regard as true. 22 They are more often than not satisfied
with reasonable probability, when they are not altogether allied with the
popular tenets of their philosophic forebears."
As regards the nature of the soul, Scotus believes that it should be
melted into the same pot as the angels. If therefore it is not possible to
have several angels belonging to the same species (as indeed Aquinas
holds), there should also be no defensible reason to think that diverse
souls should belong to the same species. Souls are pure forms, just as
angels are pure forms. With reference to Aquinas' position to the effect
that the union with the body gives the soul its individuation, and an
inclination which makes it naturally bound to the body, Scotus objects
that it is not the inclination in a being that constitutes its nature. It is not
because the soul has a certain inclination towards the body that it is this
or that soul, but because it is this or that soul that it is inclined towards
the body. Mere inclination cannot make a being a separate being or
entity. An inclination presupposes the being to which it inheres much
24
like an accident, which belongs to a substance.
The foundation of Scotus' argumentations against the possibility of
demonstrating immortality is, as seen from above, his conception of
being, which is also linked with his theory of creation. To say that the
soul has its own life independent of the body would entail that it was
created directly in itself and for itself. If therefore it can be
demonstrated that the soul is immortal, one would be in a position to
know that it can exist without the body, from where it can also be
concluded that it was created in itself, and not as form of the body.
However, it is not possible for a philosopher, uulike the Christian, to
imagine how God can create the soul as a being completely independent
of the composite. The point of divergence between the philosopher and
the Christian is that for the former, given that the soul is the act of the
body, it cannot have been created apart, with a separate destiny and
being, while for the latter, this is a real possibility. Scotus thus rejects
what we have called the Platonism of Aquinas, the foundation of which
is the conception of an act of being which the soul can exercise on its
own and which it can communicate to the body. If this idea of being
were granted, then there would be nothing to prevent the soul from
having a being that cannot be destroyed with the destruction of the
185
composite. 2s
Such a soul contains, for Scotus, indications, which can lead to the
affmnation of the possibility of immortality. Here he goes back to one
of the basic principles by means of which Aquinas tries to prove both
the spirituality and immortality of the soul, i.e. the fact of intellectual
knowledge. It is clear to all that the human being can understand, and
because it is on account of his form that man can carry out this activity
it constitutes a formal principle of the composite of his being. Human
beings everywhere know that they have the capacity to know and that
this activity is one that does not require the use of any material organ,
uulike all the operations of sensible knOWledge. Intellectual knowledge
is always about universals, and concerns the apprehension of the most
common principles of being. It is on account of this that the science of
metaphysics is possible, because the type of knowledge that the rational
being is capable of acqniring makes it possible for the science to have a
specific object. That human beings are capable of exercising the
operations involved in intellectual knowledge is because there is
something in their nature which is capable of receiving such knowledge,
and such a receptor cannot have in its nature anything associated with
corporeality. The receptacle of knowledge can either be the soul or the
human being as a whole by means of its soul, and if this operation is
formative to man as rational being, it means that the rational soul must
be the form of the human being. For Duns Scotus,it is very reasonable
that the soul that is capable of such an operation should be immortal, or
in fact that it is immortal. Nevertheless, one cannot prove this by force
of an argument from the point of view of philosophy. To support his
conclusion, Scotus reviews one of the arguments, which have been used
to defend immortality - the argument from the desire of everlasting
being.
Our review of the argument from desire shows that, first, Aquinas
seems to take it as a sign of immortality, at least in the Summa
thealagiae, and not as an indepehdent argument. Again, wherever he
states the argument, he links it with knowledge of rational beings as
such, distinguishing it from the desire of brutes for self-preservation,
186
and the preservation of their own species." For Scotus, the desire for
everlasting existence is not different from the inclination towards a
particular act. This inclination is equivalent to the tendency for selfpreservation which Aristotle hhnself attributes to all beings, e~dowed as
they are with natnral striving to remain in existence so far as .t d,:"ends
on them. That this desire is not fulfilled is seen in the corruption of
composites. In any case, there is no certainty that what living beings
desire is eternal existence as inunortal souls, or that what they actually
desire is not to continue to exist as they are. Even if it is admitted that
man has the natnral desire for inunortality, it is possible that he desires
the impossible. Where the onus of proof lies is to prove first that man is
inunortal, and not whether he desires inunortality.
It is remarkable from the above that Scotus does not take account of
Aquinas' linking of the argument from desire with the ~owle~ge of
infinite or everlasting being, which seems necessary to d.stmgmsh the
human desire from the desire of brute animals which are not immortal in
Aquinas' system. Again, Aquinas takes due account of the general
tendency of forms to persist in being, and adds that it is on account of
the contrariety of composition that other forms perish, and that human
souls are spared that fate because they are themselves the ve'!' s.ource. of
their being and do not depend for their being on the compos.te m which
they are found. 21 It seems obvious from what we have seen that the
basis of these exceptions is not acceptable to Scotus, but because of the
failure to take account of these, he ranges the rational soui in the same
category as brute souls. Referring to Aristotle's affIrmation that natnre
always desires what is better, he asserts that inunortality is better than
corruptibility, and consequently, man must desire the inunortality of the
soul. Even then, it does not follow that each particular soul must be
inunortal for natnre can very well achieve its desire by according
inunortality to the species through the process of generation and
corruption, which assures the perpetuity of the species, but not of the
individual." In fact, for Scotus, the argument from the desire of being is
not only ineffective in proving inunortality (omne. medium ex
desiderium naturali videtur inejjicax), it can also be srud to beg the
question at issue. Since the point in dispute is to prove inunortality, one
29
cannot go from the desire for it to its afftrmation. Hence the type of
incorruptibility that Scotus is ready to consider for rational souls on
philosophical grounds is the type that Aquinas accept~ for .b,:"te ~ouls
because of their inability to know being as such, which d.sttngmshes
them from intellective souls.
187
m:
188
189
190
fear of possible consequences that may follow the vicious act. Thus he
rejects completely the view that morals can only be maintaioed with the
presupposition of inunortaiity. His view seems, as Krysteller says, "far
superior to those contrary opinions that are often expressed and
propagated even in our days, and that usually go unchallenged.""
The conclusion of Pomponazzi as regards the question of
inunortality is that the matter is neutral so long as philosophy is
concerned. He does not however question the reality of inunortality.
hnmortality is a religious belief and must be admitted on the grounds of
faith alone. God himself has shovm beyond reasonable doubt in the
Bible that the soul is inunortal, and this must be accepted as such as an
article of faith. It follows that any attempt to prove the contrary must be
false and unacceptable. However, going on the strength of reason alone,
and in spite of the efforts of philosophers, there is no argument
convincing enough to show that the soul is immortal. 38
Thomas de Vio Cajetan, the great commentator on St. Thomas
Aquinas, concludes his philosophic life by affirming basically the same
position as his contemporary, Pomponazzi. But given his diametrically
opposed positions about the provability of immortality, we shall
distinguish the two periods of his life by naming them first and second
Cajetan. The first Cajetan, the faithful defender of Thomas Aquinas'
position, at times seems to go farther than his master in affirming, in a
more Wlequivocal manner, positions, which Aquinas asserts with a
measure of nuance. An example of this is the nature of the soul, in
union and in separation from the body. The soui for him is naturally
united to the body as form, and this union is effected propter melius
because of the soul's special way of knowing by reverting to the
phantasms. Even though the mode of knowledge by receiving species
from separate, non-sensible being is superior in itself, it is not so to the
soul because of its nature (est nobilius et melius simpliciter, sed non
animae). Such knowledge that is effectuated by a direct infusion of
species from spiritual being is for him not against nature, but lies above
the nature of the soul. The inunortality of the soul is demonstrable and
this truth is, to the first Cajetan, so clear that in obvious reference to
Pomponazzi's conclusion that inunortality is problema neulrum, he
poured invectives on anyone who is against the possibility of
demonstrating its truth." In keeping with such a diatribe, he goes on in
his writings and commentaries to defend the immortality of the soul.
All the arguments he uses in defence of immortality are the usual
ones knovm to the scholastics, even though he employs different
illustrations to make the same point. In a sermon delivered before Pope
191
Julius II in 1503, he refers to the contention that the soul cannot have in
its being the form of any of the things it is capable of knowing in order
to show its independence from the material, and hence its inunortaiity.
For the first Cajetan, the soul is like a judge who must not be
sympathetic to any of the positions that are presented before him ifhe is
to judge properly. In the same way, the rational soul must not share the
nature of the things it knows, but must be spiritual to know the way it
40
does. He also calls the presence of natural desire in man to the defence
of inunortality.41 But for him, its power of demonstration depends on
the soul not being fixated on a mere wishful desire or unreal
imagination, but rather that the nature of the knOwing soul strives
towards the absolute. Such a desire would not be vain because natural
striving is never in vain.
In his commentary on" Aristotle's De anima, he asserts that the
position of Aristotle on the problem of immortality is not unequivocal,
and seeks to clarify what he intended to say about the issue, especially
with reference to the famous passage of Aristotle in Book Three of the
De anima. For him, that Aristotle supports immortality can be read from
what he says at the begirming of the treatise to the effect that if indeed
the soul has some operation on its ovm independent of the body, it
would also be able to exist without it." In the same way, he tries to
derive from the teaching of Aristotle principles and statements from
which the immortality of the soul can be concluded. In the De anima, as
well as in his commentary on Aquinas' Summa theologiae, he describes
the human soul as a forma media,43 a form that is endowed with such
being that it is independent of matter, and can, at the same time, form a
composite with matter. The human soul is, as such, the lowest being in
the ladder of spiritual beings, and as a result of this is subsistent, as
distinct from material forms that are bound with the matter with which
they are united.
These teachings are all not more than the elaboration of Aquinas'
views but the second Cajetan appears to revoke them in his last writing.
While the first Cajetan is ready to pour invectives on anyone who would
describe the problem of inunortality as philosophically neutral, the
second clearly expresses doubt about the ability of reason to
demonstrate that the soul is immortal. In the commentary on Paul's
letter to the Romans he states his conviction that one truth cannot be
against another truth, but still that he does not know how to unite
divergent positions about matters such as the freedom of the will and
the providence of God, just as he is ignorant about the mystery of the
Trinity, the immortality of the soul and the incarnation of the word of
192
193
surprisingly, means that there were not only thinkers who were willing
not only to disparage the possibility ofphiiosophy proving immortality,
but others who were ready to deny the fact of the matter itself. Still it
must be noted that through the changes in spirit occasioned by the
passage of time, there still remained a host of serious philosophers for
whom the immortality of the soul is demonstrable by unaided reason.
The growing independence of philosophy as a science in the modern
epoch was accompanied by the progressive strides in the physical
sciences and mathematics which had enormous influence on the
evolution of philosophy. With Euclid's geometry and Newton's physics
foisted on the consciousness of thinkers as the epitome of scientific
progress, the reaction of many philosophers was to replicate the type of
progress realized in these fields in philosophy as well. While Hume
inveighed against metaphysics as a science in his book burning
campaign,46 Kant wanted to review the whole fabric of speculative
philosophy in order to determine how far it was possible as a science.
The effort to bring into philosophy the method and evident progress of
the natural sciences is traceable in most major thinkers of the modern
period. Descartes' quest for certainty led to his methodic doubt, while
the Ethics of Spinoza is a testimony to the effort to construct a
philosophy loaded, as in geometry, with axioms, definitions and
propositions.
Descartes seems to have initiated the quest for certainty with his
decision to put into doubt all the data of the senses because of their
latent possibility to deceive. In the end, he adopted a radical dualism of
mind and matter, a dualism so strict that it becomes almost impossible
to see how the two can act together as one being. Even though
Descartes lived and worked within the shadows of scholastic
philosophy,'7 his dualism and anthropology speak more of Platonism
than the hylemorphic relationship between soul and body, which was
the hallmark of scholastic anthropology. On the question of immortality,
Descartes was more concerned about the moral effect of the tenet that
after this present life, we have no more to hope for than flies and ants.
Outside the denial of the existence of God, there is nothing more
susceptible to turn weak characters from the pursuit of virtue than such
teachings. In his view, an understanding of how different the other
lower creatures are from us helps us to better appreciate the arguments
that seek to prove that the soul is totally independent of the body and
does not perish when the body perishes. In addition, since outside the
destruction of the body, we are not able to find any other possible cause
of its destruction, we must come to the conclusion that the soul is
194
Aquin~,
195
The arguments from God's justice are, for him, grounded in the
supposition that God has other attributes than the ones that we are able
to learn from this universe. Hume is of the view that if we are to judge
by reason alone, the capacity of man is limited to the present life, and
the fear of the future in many people is a result of precepts and
education artificially maintained to ensure a livelihood for those who
teach them. 52 Concerning the question of reward and punisinnent, he
uses the principle of the chain of causality (even though he rejects the
principle in his own philosophy): if everything that happens must have a
cause, and this line of causality goes on to the ultimate cause, it means
that everything that happens is ordained by this cause, and cannot at the
same time be the object of its punisinnent. If for the sake of the
argument we concede the reality of such reward and punisinnent, more
difficulties will follow. The range of human merit is wide. For which of
these merits should we expect perpetual reward? Our idea of rightful
punisinnent is that it must have a proper end, and no end can in addition
be served by punisinnent "after the whole scene is closed." Again,
proportionality of punisinnent to the offence is in accordance with the
human conception of punisinnent. If so, it is incomprehensible to erect
eternal punisinnent for temporary offence. 53
The concentration of the above on moral arguments for immortality
seems to be in consonance with the trend of the epoch in which much
was made of the moral implication of the supposition of the mortality of
the soul. For Descartes as well as for Berkeley, a strong reason which
recommends the immortality of the soul, is its effect on morality or
virtue. From what we saw in Aquinas, the question of morality is in fact
a peripheral consideration in the question of immortality. Hume's effort
is to bring the moral defence of immortality under the judgement of his
sceptical philosophy, taking as given the conclusions of this philosophy.
Thus, for him, the origin of our moral distinction is the human
sentiment, and the main source of moral ideas is the consideration of the
benefit of human society, and such benefit cannot be so consequential
that it should be safeguarded by eternal punisinnent.
What Hume calls the physical arguments are indeed his argument for
the mortality of the human soul. These are in his view the only
philosophical arguments, which merit our acceptance. Only a few of
these are worth recalling here. The first is the demonstration from the
analogy from nature: when two things are so closely united that
whenever there is an alteration in one, there is also a proportionate
alteration in the other, it is reasonable to conclude that when a greater
alteration occurs in one of them, it must be accompanied by an equally
196
197
198
I
Il
I
I
1
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
NOTES
I
476.
4 "The Soul-Body Problem in St. Thomas", p. 477: "Without taking these
differences into account, he moves quickly to his conclusion affirming the
substantiality of the soul. The question may be raised as to the legitimacy of
this, for the example of "hand" argues to substance in one meaning (a purely
reductive one), whereas his notion of "soul" as substance in the argument given
takes on a different and non-reductive meaning. Is this warranted, or did St.
Thomas beg the question in his haste to aUy philosophy with theology?"
Kreycbe's critique is correct, but in fairness to St. Thomas, it should be said
206
Thom~ Aquinas
that his reason for enumerating different ways of being substance is in fact
intended to show that the meaning of substance when applied to the soul
should not be taken as the normal sense of a whole being a substance, since the
soul is only part of the composite. Even if the end-result in fact succeeds in
making the soul a substance as other substances, in the passage, which Kreycbe
refers to, the intention of Aquinas is very different.
5 ht some passages, Aquinas clearly states that the soul is a spiritual substance
without much qualification. See for instance De sprit. creal, II, ad 4: " ...
dicendum quod anima secundum suam essentiam est fonna corporis, et non
secundum aliquid additum. Tamen in quantum attingitur a corpore, est forma;
in quantum vero superexcedit corporis proportionem," dicitur spiritus, vel
spiritualis substantia."
6 In works such as the Commentary on the Sentences, etc., he tackles the issue
within the text on immortality. In the Summa and Contra gentiles, it is given
separate sections, while in Compendium and the Quodlibet, he prefers to deal
with the issue inunediately after arguing for immortality. In all cases however
the cotulection with immortality, as in the De unilate, is clearly attested to.
7 B. H. Zedler argues that Averroes never denied personal immortality, and
that the attacks against him and the distortion of his thought is due in fact to a
prejudice derived from Christian religious belief. "Medieval Christians have
attributed to Averroes a position that he should perhaps have had. They have
done him the honor of assuming that his thought was fully coherent, consistent,
and well integrated. Logically, they thought, he should have denied the
doctrine of personal inunortality. Such a denial might have been more
consistent with his total position than an acceptance of the possibility of the
doctrine. But Averroes may not have been the logical well-integrated thinker he
was believed to have been." Cf. "Averroes and Immortality," The New
Scholasticism, 28 (1954), pp. 438 - (453)
8 The principle that leads William to such an absurd conclusion is stated as
follows: ''Non enim est possibile substantiam debilitari quantum" ad esse ex
quacumque dispositione cum ex ilia, invalescat in operatione ipsius." (De
anima, V. 25, p. 153a.). Elsewhere he uses the positive effect of ill health on
vice t~ argue or the same point: drunkenness can be forgotten in times of
serious ill health, and thus the soul is burdened with less vice, which means
more life for it (Cf. De anima, VI, 5, p. 165a)
9
See for instance chapter 3 of B. Mondin's book St. Thomas Aquinas
Philosophy in the Commentary on the Sentences ofPeter Lombard, pp. 58 -74
which is entitled "An Anthropology of Imago die."
10 F. C. Copleston,Aquinas, p. 174
II Commentarii in Somnium Scipionis, 1, 14. 15.
12 Cf. Epistolade anima, Migne (p. L., 194), 1885.
\3 Cf. Summa de bono, 265, 10 - 266, 109.
14 See Summa de creaturis, q. 59, a. 2, 21, pp. 524a - 525a: Before outlining
the probable arguments, Albert states the main principle of the order of being
207
as follows ''Ubique contingit invenire duo extrema inter res naturae, contingit
accipere medium. Hoc probatur per id quod habetur in libro de Animalibus, ubi
dicit Aristoteles, quod natura non venit de marino ad agreste, nisi per gradus:
nec venit a vegetabili ad sensibile, nisi per gradus: et ideo inter animal hebens
sensum unum et animal hebens sensus omnes, sunt plura media. Et hoc est
quod dicit Dionysius, quod lex divinitatis est per propria media, et per media
ultima adducere."
IS
See O. Lottin. "L'influence litteraire du Chancelier Philippe sur les
theologiens prethomiste," RTAM, 2 (1930), pp. 311 - 326. See also Wichi's
introduction to his edition of the Summa de bono. Until the edition of this
treatise of Philip, the Franciscan Alexander of Hales was taken as the first
thinker of the thirteenth-century to elaborate the doctrine of the transcendals.
However, Wichi's work has completely revised this claim, and it is
uudoubtedly Philip from whom the first outline of the transcendals originated.
For more on the doctrine of transcendentals, see Jan Aertsen. Medieval
Philosophy and the Transcendentals (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1996) (especially the
chapter on the beginning of the doctrine of transcendentals with Philip the
Chancellor, pp. 25 - 40)
16 Cf. S. T., la,47, I & 2; S. C. G., U, 45.
17 G. SI. Hilaire, op cil., p. 343.
" F. D. Wilhelmsen, op. ci!., 337 - 338.
19 A. C. Pegis, At the Origins of the Thomistic Notion of Man (New York:
Macmillan), 1963, p. 49.
20 O. Cullmann, Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Body,? p.60.
21 A. Kenny, op. cil., p. 175
22 Reportata. Parisiensa, Opera omnia XI, (repr. Hildesheim, 1969) I. IV, d.
43, q. 2, n. 17: ''Dnde non oportet quod onme quod dicit philosophus, sit
demonstratio, quia multa dixenmt philosophi quae acceperunt a prioribus
philosophis, persuasi per rationes probabiles eorum et non semper per
demonstrativas."
23 Opus oxoniense, I. N, d. 43, q. 2, n, 16: ''frequenter non habebant nisi
quasdam probabiles persuasiones vel vulgarem opinionem praecedentium
philosophorum. "
24 Ibid., I. U, d. 3, q. 7, n. 4; I. U, p. 279.
" Cf. Quodlibet, Opera omnia, XU (repr. Hildesheim, 1969) q. IX, n. 17: "Isto
modo compositum perfectum in specie dicitur esse, et solum illud; pars autem
ejus dicitur esse per accidens tantummodo, vel magis proprie participative isto
esse totius; sic igitur solum compositum est per se ens, accipiendo esse secundo
modo; anima autem intellectiva non dicitur subsistens nisi improprie et
secundum quid, Beet dicatur ens, et per se ens primo modo accipiendo esse."
26 See above Chapter 3, section, pp.
27 Cf. S. T., la, 75, resp., see above Chapter 3, section pp.
2S Rep. par. I, IV, d. 43, q. 2, n. 15; Rep. par.!. IV, d. 43, quo 2, n. 26.
208
29
ed Wolters (Edinburgh: Nelson, 1962), p. 158: "planum es~ quod non potest
probari desiderium naturale ad aliquid, nisi primo probetur possibilitas in
natura ad illud, et per consequens e converso arguendo est petitio principi."
30 Cf. O. Kristeller, Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance (Stanford:
Stanford University Press., 1964), p. 79
31 Pomponazzi, De ;mmortalitate, in Abhandlung tiber der Unsterblichkeit der
Seele, ed.& tr. B. Mojsiseh (Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1990), p. 52: "De veritate
quidem huius positionis apud me nulla prorsus est ambiguitas, cum scriptura
canonica, quae cuilibet rationi et experimento humane praeferenda est, cum
Deo data sit, hane positionem sanciat. Sed quod apud me vertitur in dubium,
est, an ista dicta excedant limites naturales sic, quod aliquod vel creditum vel
revelatum praesupponant, et confonnia sint dictis Aristotelis, sicut ipse Divus
Thomas enuntiat."
32 The problem of the knowledge of the separated soul has also be raised in
another treatise where Pomponazzi tried to answer the question "utrum anima
sit mortalis." He raises essentially the difficulties which we have seen as
accompanying the theory of the soul existing apart from the body, but tries to
answer it in line with Thomas in obvious consideration of the reaction of the
teaching of the Church on the subject, especially as expressed by the fifth
Lateran council. On the knowledge of the separated soul he writes: "Altera
difficultas est quod operetur anima a corpore separata: Si nihil, anima erit
frustra; nihil autem videtur operari, quia hoc maxime esset intelligere, quia
anima per phantasmata intelligit, quae sunt in corpore. Si autem non habet
intelligere, nec habet velIe. Dico quod anima, cum est separata, non intelligit
per phantasmata, sed per species infusas a Deo; anima enim habet duas
operationes; prima est intelligere cum phantasmate, secunda intelligere sine
phantasmata quando est separata, sed me remitto Ecclesiae, et notetis quod de
inferno et paradiso, non tantum meminit Ecclesia,sed etiam Plato et philosophi.
praeter sceleratwn Aristotelem." (Questiones in libro De anima, cited in O.
Pluta, op. cit, p. 57)
33
De immortalitate, op. cit., p. 78: "Cum itaque primus modus ponens
intelIectivum realiter distingui a sensitivo in mortalibus secundum omnes
impugnatus sit modos et secundus ponens, quod intellectivum et sensitivum
sunt idem re et tale est simpliciter immortale et secundwn quid mortale, sit
valde ambiguus nee convenire videatur Aristoteli, reliquum est, ut ponamus
ultimwn modum, qui ponens sensitivum in homine identificare intellectivo
dicit, quod essentialiter et vere hoc est mortale, sed secundum quid inunortale."
34 Cf. Ibid, pp. 168 - 174.
3S Ibid., p. 194: "Quare magis essenialiter praemiatur, qui non accidentaliter
praemiatur, eo, qui a accidentaliter praemiatur. Eodem quoque modo qui
vitiose operatur et accidentaliter non punitur, minus reditur puniri eo qui
accidentaliter non punitur; nam poena culpae maior et deterior est poena
209
damni; et cum poena damni adiungitur culpe, diminuit culpam. Quare non
Eunitus accidentaliter magis punitur essentialiter eo, qui accidentaliter punitur."
6 Cf. Aquinas Against the Averroists, op. cit., p.1
37 O. Kristeller, Eight Philosophers o/the Italian Renaissance, p.84.
38 Cf. Pomponazzi, De immortalitate., pp. 228 - 236.
39 T. de Vio Cajetan, Opuscula, cited in B. Hallensleben, Communicatio:
Anthropologie und Gnadenlehre be; Thomas de Vio Cajetan, (MOOster:
Asehendorfliehes Verlag, 1985) p. 194 : "si ratione investigata et ad sensum
usque explorationem deducta humanae sententiae quietem tribunt ineruditi
problem~
indocilis. tardi, hebetis, stupidique est immortalitatem animorum
revocare neutram."
40 Ibid., p. 193: "sit qui iudicat, a rebus iudicandis alienus: nam si illanun
aliqua inhaeresit, aut totum sibi iudiciwn inflectit, aut falsam fecit aliarum
afferre censuram."
41 L~c. cit., "His autem iunctum si fuerit, quod intellectualis spiritus
desldenum tendat ad esse, non hac aut ilIa aetate conclusum, sed ab ornni
tempore elevatum (quoniam intellectu apprehensum solwnmodo cupit bonum,
quod ab omnium temponun differentiis, quia universale est, constat esse
ab~olutum) consequens est ut is, quo intelligimus et sapimus, animus, in
unlVersum tempus effusum habeat vivendi desiderium cum pari tobore, evadere
quippe quia non potest, quin aut certo tempore, aut semper esse desideret, cum
definito
non subsit tempori, reliquum est, ut ad sempitemwn se extendat ."
a
De anima, 403a 8.
43 "inter fonnas materiales (quae sciliCet educuntur de potentia materiae, ac per
hoc dependent secundum esse a materia utpote eanun causa) et fonnas
separatas. omnino a materia (quae in seipsis subsistunt, sine onmi
commumcatione sui esse in materia, quas angelos dicimus) rationabile medium
ponitur fonna secundwn esse independens a materia et tamen conununicans
secundum esse in materia (quae ex independentia habet quod non est educta de
potentia materiae, et ex corrununicabilitate quod in materia sit et quod materia
partieipet esse illius." (Cited in B. Hallensleben, op.eit., p. 197)
44 Zu Rom, 9, 23 in Ibid., p. 200: ''Respondeo me scire quod verum vero non
est contrarium. sed nescire haec iungere: sicut nescio mysterium trinitatis sicut
nescio animam irrunortalem, sicut nescio verbtun caro factum est. et si~ilia,
quae tamen omnia credo."
4S Cf. E. Gilson, History a/Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages, pp. 397:;9; F. Van Steenberghen, La philosophie au XIlIe siecle, 1966, p. 388-391.
D. Home, An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, ed. C. W. Hendel
(New York: Liberal Arts, 1955), p. 173.
47 See E. Gilson, Etudes sur Ie role de la pensee medievale dans la/ormation
du systeme cartesien (paris: J.Vrin, 1951).
48 R. Descartes, Discours de la Methode, sect 5 in Oeuvres de Descartes v. 6
(paris: J. Vrin, 1965), p. 59.
'
u:
210
60
Our presentation of the argument here follows L. W. Beck s cle~er
restatement of it in his book A Commentary on Kant's Critique of Pracflcal
Reason (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1960), pp. 267 - 269.
61 J. S. Mill, "Immortality," in Three Essays on religion, (1878) (repr. London:
Greg. International, 1969), p. 199.
62 Ibid., p. 201.
63 lbid.,203.
64
R. Swinburne, "Nature and Immortality of the Soul," in Routledge
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, v.9, 1998, p. 46.
.
.
os Cf. K. Campbell, Body and Mind (Notre Dame: Notre Dame Umvers>ty
Press 1984)' J. Lacks, "The Impotent Mind," Review of MetaphYSICS 17
(1963), pp. i87 - 199; F. Jackson, "Epiphenomenal Qualia," Philosophical
Quarterly, 32 (1982), pp. 127 - 136.
.
66 See B. Russell's Analysis of Mind (London: Allen and Unwm, 1921), pp.
49
Conclusion
212
sensible fonn; the desire for endless happiness; the intellects' grasp of
immaterial universal, which is a pointer to the nature of the soul itself;
the whole process of knowledge, which confirms all the more the
spiritual nature of the soul.
Through the dependence on his predecessors, Aquinas exhibits some
remarkable originality and independence in the use of the principles of
the old proofs. One therefore sees SOme progress and evolution in the
employment of these arguments. The fact that throughout the six texts
on immortality, the argument from God's justice, and that from the
implications of contemplation for immortality are used once each
indicates a measure of discrimination among the plethora of proofs at
his disposal. Even though the absence of any gradation of the
arguments would seem to suggest that Aquinas does not reach the level
of discrimination attained by Albert the Great or even Alexander of
Hales, that there is some sort of selection among the available proofs
would speak for the opinion that all the points he makes for immortality
are not intended to have equal convincing powers. That would explain
why relatively very few arguments are employed in the voluminous
Summa theologiae, which is the most mature and most comprehensive
of all his works. The curious omission of the popular argument from the
order of being can also be explained as a consequence of Aquinas'
silent weighing ofthe arguments.
Aquinas links all his major arguments to the phenomenon of
knowledge. Despite his Aristotelian epistemology, intellectual
knowledge is hypostatized in the fonn of universals, and this serves as
an independent standpoint to prove immortality. But such arguments as
those from the desire for endless existence and the presence of
contraries are so linked with the ability of man to know as was never
found in any of his predecessors. Thus it is not just that man by nature
desires to live forever, but it is his ability to apprehend what he desires
that makes the fulfihnent of this desire reasonable and necessary.
In outliuing these and other arguments, Aquinas intends to
demonstrate convincingly that the rational soul is by nature endowed
with immortality. There is no strong reason to doubt that he believes
that the project achieved its intended aim. Over and above the specific
problems linked with the proofs, the phenomenon of death, the refusal
to consider brute souls as candidates for immortality of any type, the
state of the soul after its separation from the body, as well as the fact of
resurrection and immortality of the body are general problems that
follow on the heels of the philosophical reflection on immortality. The
solutions to some of these problems, like that of death and resurrection,
Conclusion
213
naturally lead deep into the preserves of theology, bUlhe views this fact
as making even more comprehensible the reflection on immortality.
Our analysis of the arguments indicates that there is none of the major
arguments without serious problems. The critique of the details of the
arguments does not however lead to the rejection of the relevance of the
grand project of reflecting on immortality, both in the context of the
philosophy of Thomas Aquinas and in philosophy in general.
Aquinas uses the method of enumeration of as many favourable
points as possible in support of immortality. The reason behind the
employment of this method is the latent belief that the cumulative
effects of all these points have more convincing power than the force of
any single consideration. This method also goes in consonance with his
predecessors with the single exception of Albert the Great. Our review
of the earlier critics of Aquinas, Scotus, Pomponazzi and Cajetan shows
that none adequately takes notice of this method. Thus they judge the
whole project of proving immortality on the strength of individual
arguments, especially the argument from desire and the moral
consideration of rewarding virtue in an after-life. Many modem
thinkers like Descartes, Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Voltaire and Mill also
concentrate more on the implications of immortality for morality. In all,
whether they speak in support or against it, their reflections on the
theme are much less rigorous than that of Aquinas and the thinkers of
his time. Among these, J. S. Mill appears to be the only person who
even as much as refers to the fact of intellectual knowledge in relation
to immortality. This lack of rigour overflows into the contemporary
epoch where the combined forces of secularization as well as the
spectacular progress in empirical science and technology appear to
effectively shunt the theme of immortality off from the mainstream of
philosophical investigation. Though the character of mind in general
continues to be a potent object for contention, in which there is hardly
any hope of arriving at any general agreement, it is not surprising that
some have, like materialists through the history of philosophy, come to
question the reasonableness of erecting an extra category called the soul
or the mind over and above the matter of which the body is composed.
Despite the various turns in Aquinas' discussion of immortality, the
issue remains vital for a balanced understanding of his philosophy, and
~or explanations of the reasons for the positions he takes on particular
Issues. Even though these texts on immortality are all in the fonn of
proofs, following the tradition of his time, the importance of the theme
of immortality should not be consigned to the judgement of how much
the proofs are acceptable to the minds of today. The nature of
philosophy, in which hardly any issue is settled definitively, should also
214
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